‘Intimacy’: Tales of taboo & the family bone

MAKE ROOM FOR DADDY: (Left to right): Austin Cauldwell, Ella Dershowitz & Daniel Gerroll. Photo: Monique Carboni.

INTIMACY
Written by Thomas Bradshaw
Directed by Scott Elliott
The New Group at Theatre Row
Acorn Theatre
410 West 42nd Street
(212-239-6200), www.thenewgroup.org

By Scott Harrah

Shock value is nothing new and can be a glorious thing for those who appreciate the intentionally lowbrow.  Film icon John Waters, the “Pope of Trash,” and best-selling “raunchy moralist” novelist Jackie Collins have made fortunes and become legends selling campy, over-the-top, sex-filled tales to the masses.  To the average suburban parent, Thomas Bradshaw’s Intimacy might seem like morally reprehensible filth, but to most jaded New Yorkers or anyone who isn’t offended by pornography, it is tame, entertaining stuff indeed. If you are easily shocked by anything sexual, it’s best not to read this review any further as this show is all about laughing at the lurid.

Mr. Bradshaw, the Northwestern University professor and playwright known for such controversial dramas as Burning, has made a name for himself pushing the proverbial envelope on the New York stage, and his latest might be his most outrageous yet.  As fans and critics of the playwright can attest, walkouts are common in Mr. Bradshaw’s plays, and this one is no exception.

Stereotypes, crazy fantasies and taboo topics are the titillating staples of the average porn film, and Mr. Bradshaw tosses in all the clichés and more in our face in Intimacy, a tawdry comic potboiler set in upper-middle-class suburbia that has many moments of gleeful gross-outs and scatological humor as it purports to explore affluence, parental expectations, class, social mores, racism and just how far people will go when it comes to sex.

The plot centers on a group of suburban families that live in a modern-day version of Peyton Place, but with prurient secrets that would even make that book’s author, the late Grace Metalious, blush.  James (Daniel Gerroll) is a British former Wall Street magnate and widower still grieving the death of his wife as son Matthew (Austin Cauldwell) prepares to apply to colleges.  Much to his father’s surprise, Matthew doesn’t want to go to university and instead dreams of making avant-garde indie films as he idolizes Lars von Trier, Quentin Tarantino and Andy Warhol.

Meanwhile, academics Pat (Laura Esterman), a feminist-theory professor, and her queer-studies professor husband, Jerry (Keith Randolph Smith), are grappling with the inexplicable behavior of their increasingly rebellious teenage daughter, the blonde “harlot” Janet (Ella Dershowitz). Pat, an aging hippie chick, must have overdosed on too many Nancy Friday paperbacks about housewives pursuing great orgasms back in the 1970s because she is more than willing to discuss the joys of cunnilingus with her daughter.

Fred (David Anzeulo) is a stocky Latino contractor working to remodel James’ home for little profit because he is grateful to the man’s late wife, a top-notch oncologist who helped cure his teenage daughter Sarah (Déa Julien) of leukemia.  Sarah is distraught that her mother (who is never seen onstage) is forced to work at Wal-Mart and the kids at school ridicule her about it.

As liberal and well-educated as the families in this upscale community might be, they harbor horribly racist feelings, particularly about Fred’s Mexican workers, many of whom are described as “lazy” and would rather “play the banjo” than finish a day’s work.  Ay yi yi.

The narrative is loaded with hokey homilies and intentionally tasteless jokes about race and sexuality, plus numerous gratuitous scenes of literal toilet humor.  Jerry is convinced he might have colon cancer because he has dark stools, and makes his wife look at them, followed by a scene of him taking a steamy dump on the toilet, complete with sound effects of flatulence. Is it silly enough to evoke snickering from the audience?  Yes, but is any of this necessary or actually funny?

When Matthew insists he doesn’t want to go to college, his father offers him $40,000 to make two short films within a specified time period.  One can guess what happens next as the plot descends into predictable territory that contains every half-baked twist from John Waters films, “sexploitation” flicks and trashy novels from the past 40 years.  It’s a good deal for Matthew, who isn’t exactly college material and spends his days secretly masturbating in his bedroom and trying to hide this fact from his pious papa.  If you’re a male of a certain age, it’s impossible not to laugh at this because we all have painful memories of those awkward teenage years, trying to cover up our raging hormones and dirty magazines from our parents’ prying eyes.  However, anyone who loves Waters’ Serial Mom knows Mr. Bradshaw literally lifted the idea from that classic.

We soon learn the truth about young Janet when James finds her nubile body spread-eagled in an X-rated pictorial in Barely Legal magazine.  James doesn’t want anything to do with Jerry, Pat and slutty little Janet. Of course, hypocritical James is the one who bought the skin mag because the only way he can overcome the grief of his wife’s death is devouring porn depicting 18-year-old jailbait.

It is easy to go along with the story and all the preposterous subplots in act one, but things just unravel by the second act as the whole play becomes like watching one of the implausible, poorly written and downright stupid porno films Mr. Brawshaw is lampooning. Perhaps it’s a spoiler to note, but no surprise when we learn that macho Fred is a closet case and secretly masturbates to online gay porn and, like his daughter, has the hots for Matthew and gets so aroused for the fledgling filmmaker that he strips down to a thong for the guy.

Derek McLane’s clever set anchors the story beautifully.  From the pastiche of the suburban street to TV sets showing raunchy old Ron Jeremy and Linda Lovelace videos, the play is a rich, visual feast.  There are also some fine performances from the cast, particularly stage veteran Daniel Gerroll. However, as ambitious as Scott Elliott’s direction might be, it is impossible for him to make the actors transcend Mr. Bradshaw’s amateurish, paper-thin script, a hodgepodge of everything we ever wanted to know about sex that we’ve seen before.

From incest and homosexuality to “double anal” and “frottage,” the smorgasbord of sexual proclivities here might have been truly shocking had Intimacy been produced half a century ago, but in the 21st century, the show is merely a theatrical stage version of one of the puerile softcore “titty” films shown on late-night cable TV.  In fact, everything would work better as a film because it could be even more sensationalistic and graphic.  Thomas Bradshaw fans certainly will not be disappointed as there is enough fake squirting semen, prosthetic penises, full-frontal male and female nudity and juvenile jokes to keep any lover of “smut” from being bored.

THY NEIGHBOR’S PORN STAR: (Left to right) David Anzuelo, Laura Esterman, Keith Randolph Smith & Ella Dershowitz. Photo: Monique Carboni.

Edited by Scott Harrah
Published January 29, 2014
Reviewed at  press performance on January 22, 2014