Theater Review: Tennessee Williams' Gritty "One Arm"

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Wednesday, 22 June 2011 10:00

Written by Kevin Filipski

Tennessee Williams’ One Arm
Adapted for the stage and directed by Moises Kaufman
Starring Claybourne Elder, Larisa Polonsky, Steven Hauck, Todd Lawson, Noah Bean, KC Comeaux, Christopher McCann, Greg Pierotti

It’s easy to see why One Arm remained an unproduced film script, even though it was written by none other than Tennessee Williams. Adapted from Williams‛ short story, the play is about Ollie Olsen (Claybourne Elder), a hustler who lost an arm to a car accident while in the Navy (where he was a championship boxer).

Set in the seediest areas of New Orleans and New York, One Arm doesn’t shy away from showing what happens to Ollie before and after killing a sleazeball who paid him $200 for a porn shoot with a young woman (Larisa Polonsky). Ollie’s downbeat story, coupled with an unflinching look at his (mostly homosexual) exploits, makes for an uncomfortable 75 minutes in the theater.

But in Moises Kaufman’s spellbinding staging, this depressing tale comes across powerfully. Williams’ dialogue has a gritty poetry that perfectly mirrors Ollie’s increasingly desperate straits.

Ollie is enacted with formidable forthrightness and an imposing physicality by Elder, while the Narrator (the play’s weakest link, unnecessarily imposing Williams’ voice onstage) is played by a wobbly Noah Bean.

Other cast members impressively play various roles, led by a stellar Polonsky as the women in Ollie’s life. Whether a French Quarter stripper, a naïve nurse, or his porn partner, Polonsky breathes a moving authenticity into each part.

From the places Ollie lived and worked to the jail cell where he spends his final days, Kaufman shrewdly makes the Acorn Theatre’s wide stage seem claustrophobic.

A first-rate cast, creatively shabby lighting and sets and an admirably honest look at a group of shady characters make for an eminent co-production by The New Group and Kaufman's Tectonic Theatre Project.

What could have been a cloyingly obvious melodrama is transformed into a staggering Greek tragedy.

Tennessee Williams’ One Arm
Acorn Theatre
410 West 42nd Street
New York City
thenewgroup.org
Opened June 9, 2011; closes July 2, 2011

For more by Kevin Filipski, visit The Flip Side blog at http://flipsidereviews.blogspot.com

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