BITTER WHEAT
By David Mamet
Directed by David Mamet
Through September 21, 2019
Garrick Theatre
Charing Cross Road
London, United Kingdom
(0330 333 4811), BitterWheatPlay.com

By David NouNou

LONDON–There was a time when David Mamet was a playwright who wrote with a certain style, had a way with words and demanded our attention. He was a force to be reckoned with and then he started taking his notoriety too seriously. Take into consideration his last four plays: The Anarchist with Patti LuPone and Debra Winger, incomprehensible, China Doll with Al Pacino, abysmal and pointless; November with Nathan Lane and Laurie Metcalf, a sad attempt at comedy of the absurd; and now Bitter Wheat, an incomplete and inexplicably bad stab at attempting to write about a Harvey Weinstein (Hollywood producer who has fallen from grace, in case you’ve been living under a rock lately) character, with the added hubris of Mr. Mamet directing the play himself.

It starts out with Barney Fein (John Malkovich), a horrible, foul-mouthed, narcissistic egomaniac Hollywood producer trying to chisel a screenwriter out of paying him for his screenplay. Lots of foul expletives are used, and the screenwriter leaves. In comes his secretary, the long-suffering and put-upon Sondra (Doon Mackichan) where she is explaining to Barney that he is being presented with an award that night, but he wants it done in his image. In comes Doctor Feel- good who gives Barney his (let’s say, Viagra?) shot because he is about to make a conquest. In comes the conquest, Yung Kim Li (Joanna Kimbook); she is a beautiful South Korean filmmaker who has just made a film entitled Bitter Wheat, which was very well received in Cannes, and the seduction begins. For the next half hour Barney is chasing Yung Li from room to room, floor to floor, in his penthouse apartment/office. He has an erection from Dr. Feel-Good, he has to make a conquest before it wears off, but she is too smart for him. She finds an alarm button presses it, sirens go off, Barney is with his pants down and the curtain comes down for Act I.

Since I saw it in a preview and knew nothing about the play, it is at intermission discussing the play with my companion that it dawned on me that it had similarities to Harvey Weinstein and the story seemed like a half-baked roman a clef about the disgraced Hollywood mogul.

Act II begins with Barney coming back after charges were pressed on him, now more women accusers are coming out and speaking against him. Disgraced and fallen from grace, Barney is informed by his secretary, Sondra, that his award/statuette is being rescinded and that she has had enough covering up for him and is walking out on him, that doesn’t go well, more expletives, she leaves. In comes Yung Kim Li, his accuser tells him she hopes there are no hard feelings and the curtain comes down.

Say what?

John Malkovich, absent too long from both the New York and London stages, poses an age-old question as to why this show would be his comeback vehicle? Was it because he was able to play an odious character with no scruples or moral compass, spewing venom at everyone throughout the night, or was he caught up in David Mamet’s faint aura?

The two people that come off best are Doon Mackikhan very good as the secretary that has crammed every skeleton in all the closets and has had enough. Joanna Kimbook is enchanting as the South Korean filmmaker.

Moral of the review: A bad play should not be directed by the playwright who wrote it, there is no distance from it and no one to tell the playwright “the emperor has no clothes on.” There is no play here.

And to think the previous night we saw The Lehman Trilogy; talk about from the sublime to the ridiculous.

 

Edited by Scott Harrah
Published July 1, 2019
Reviewed at performance in London, June 2019

 

‘BITTER WHEAT’: John Malkovich. Photo: Manuel Harlan