THEATRE REVIEW THE NERD
Brilliant premise undeveloped
The Nerd doesn't quite cut it
BYLINE: RAY CONLOGUE
November 4, 1988
Written by Larry Shue
Directed by Kevin Dowling
Starring Gary Burghoff and Peter Blais
WHEN LARRY Shue died in a plane crash three years ago, he was one of the
most promising young playwrights in the United States. He combined a
fascination with abstract issues such as language and identity with a
flair for commercial comedy.
In The Foreigner, he came near an ideal blend of the two. But in The
Nerd, this Tom Stoppard-in-the-making didn't quite hit it right, if the
production that opened this week at the Royal Alex in Toronto is an
indication.
The tale is of an architect, Willum (played by Gary Burghoff, formerly
of MASH), who has sworn an oath to do anything for a man named Rick,
who saved his life in Vietnam. He never met Rick, mind you, being
unconscious while the saving was done; but Rick shows up nonetheless, lo
these many years later.
Rick is a nerd, a word that has wider ramifications than you ever
suspected. It's not just that he has a pink suitcase with a happy face
decal on it, which contains four sets of identical clothes (green work
pants that ride above the ankle, pastel shirts); or that he can't return
from the toilet without trailing paper from his shoe.
It's also that he is always wrong, and pathologically unaware of the
consequences thereof. "Everybody urinate," he cries when an aircraft
suddenly loses altitude. "Or your kidneys will explode." When it doesn't
crash, he blithely returns to his seat, quite unaware of the damply
murderous glances being directed toward him.
In an inspired bit of casting, Peter Blais is the nerd, Rick. Blais has
a genius for playing obtuse people, which has inspired George F. Walker to
write several roles for him. But this is the first time he has carried a
lead with that special myopic elan, that voice that sounds like a cross
between a trash compactor and a fire alarm, that multi-jointed and ever-
fleeing body (never mind what it's fleeing; sometimes it seems to be
running away from itself).
Before Rick's arrival, Shue sets up a pedestrian conflict between the
architect, Willum, and his girl friend, Tansy. She is leaving smalltown
Indiana for a TV position in Washington; Willum, happily ensconced in a
nowhere career designing hotel chains and rural museums, refuses to leave.
All this is explained in a lengthy and tedious opening scene between Tansy
and their mutual friend, the witty but curmudgeonly Axel.
With Rick's arrival, the play moves into high gear. Now, critics (and
viewers) unsympathetic to Shue's wonky viewpoint have dismissed the play
as one joke told too long. But it's better than that. Shue can take a
plausible situation (the nerd draws a clumsy chimney onto an exquisite
rendering of a building), jump to a dubious conclusion (nerd decides he
should be an architect), jump again to the surreal (nerd cuts hole in
chimney and blows cigaret smoke through for added realism), and finally
jump into outright farce (nerd prints up 20,000 business cards).
The problem with the play is that such an unanchored reality as Rick
can work only if something else is anchored. But the writer isn't
interested in Terre Haute, where the action is allegedly set; nor in the
other characters. Their banter is a kind of generic yuppie wit lacking
individual voices.
The original premise (a human swamp must be tolerated, forever if
necessary, if you owe him your life) is a brilliant one, but it can't be
developed because Rick is incapable of perception or learning. The premise
of the character traps the play.
In the second act, Shue tries to escape by a clever device having
recourse to his fascination with language and cultural roles. The group
decides to pretend to be an exotic culture, reasoning that Rick will feel
so excluded he will go away. "What would you like in your tea: milk, sugar
or sand?"
But the device, while it garners a lot of cheap laughs, is not
developed as richly as Shue might have with a little more experience. And
the final revelation (which we won't reveal) in a way makes the viewer
feel that the whole play has been an unfair trick.
Gary Burghoff, who played the role of Willum on Broadway, is good in an
understated way. His phlegmatic quality makes his hopeless oath to Rick
doubly funny, though it makes it hard to see why Tansy cares about him:
their tentative hugs are fairly bloodless.
Catherine Disher is an appealing Tansy. John Evans brings his
galumphing wit and presence to the role of Axel. Ken James and Jill
Frappier indulge in some broad playing as a choleric hotel owner and his
utterly repressed wife (who politely smashes saucers with a hammer to vent
her frustration); the whole directed in workmanlike fashion by Kevin
Dowling.
Copyright 1988 Bell Globemedia Publishing Inc. and its licensors
All Rights Reserved