Review: A PUBLIC READING OF AN UNPRODUCED SCREENPLAY ABOUT THE DEATH OF WALT DISNEY at Odyssey Theatre

Waiting for Goofy

Lucas Hnath is an ambitious playwright. He turned his mother's harrowing recollections of being abducted in the '90s into a riveting, intimate one-woman tale, Dana H, where the actress lip-syncs to the recording that his mother had made. Despite such legends as Harold Prince, Betty Comden and Adolph Green flopping with a sequel to Ibsen's A Doll's House, he soldiered on with A Doll's House, Part 2, creating a funny and absorbing examination of 19th Century gender wars. Now, he examines the life of Walt Disney in A Public Reading of an Unproduced Screenplay About the Death of Walt Disney. And though Hnath appears to have a focused vision, this time his deliberate touch distances the character from the audience and leaves this reviewer nonplussed.

Walt Disney freely displays his dark side while establishing his legacy in his final years. He manipulates his brother Roy, forces his daughter to revere him when she abhors him, and sets up his clueless son-in-law to fail all so the world will realize it cannot survive without the great Walt Disney at the center of its universe.

It's readily apparent that Hnath has clear intentions with the script, revealing narcissism that has run rampant in this country and in the world. Yet it's still unclear what Nath is trying to say. The play's rhythm appears to be borrowing from the staccato dialogue of Samuel Beckett - or a bowdlerized David Mamet minus the curse words. Characters talk in half-sentences and Walt's dialogue clearly states the components of a screenplay, with him shooting out stage directions as though they're bullets. The setting is a public reading, with all actors on stage - some seated to the side when not included in the action-- flipping scripts, and controlling music prompts with a button. Hnath is deconstructing screenplays, theater, and the Grand Puba of childhood wonderment, Walt Disney. It's unclear WHY, though. Why the stilted dialogue? Why the removed setting of a reading? What is Hnath hoping to say about the human experience? And because he leaves that veiled, it's difficult for the audience to care.

This production itself does a good job with the material. Kevin Ashworth commands the stage as a smarmy, manipulative version of Walt. In all his scenes with Thomas Piper (as his put-upon brother and partner Roy), he serpentinely forces Roy to do his bidding and to cover his public image. Piper, who reveals to the audience that he's not as passive as Walt believes, does a great job conveying calm even when in the path of his brother's rage. Cory Washington is hilarious as the hapless and obsequious ex-football player, clueless that he is a pawn in Walt's plan to crash the company. Brittney Bertler has a powerful scene as Walt's daughter, acidly clarifying why no child of hers will be named Walt - a declaration undersold by her husband when he supersedes her and agrees to his father-in-law's demands to ingratiate himself.

Disney was a complicated man. The PBS two-part documentary reveals an anti-Union, pro-Joseph McCarthy bully beneath the animated mice and talking deer, but probably much of this story is fiction. Which goes back to the original question left unanswered: What were Hnath's intentions? Often, a touch of mystery lends a tantalizing investment in a project. Here, it's a deflating and distracting turn-off.

A Public Reading of an Unproduced Screenplay About the Death of Walt Disney plays at the Odyssey Theatre at 2055 S. Sepulveda Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90025 till May 1. Tickets can be purchased at https://www.onstage411.com/newsite/boxoffice/cart.asp?show_id=6109&skin_show_id=&orgin=guest

Photo Credit: Jenny Graham

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