Molly Ivins raised hell. She couldn’t abide slackers and
self-serving politicians—and she
had a platform to rail about injustice. She excoriated the incompetent and
self-righteous in her books and newspaper articles. She got away with it thanks
to her considerable Southern charm. Even when the New York Times canned her
(for her candor) she didn’t miss a beat. She had charisma to spare and late
night television loved her Texas
spunk.
Two journalists, Margaret Engel & Allison Engel, penned
the one-woman show called RED HOT PATRIOT: THE KICK-ASS WIT OF MOLLY IVINS (up
@ Lyric Stage through Jan. 31st) to pay tribute to the late political
satirist and fearless muckraker. (The play has a second character to bring Ivins
the fast breaking wires from Associated Press but this is Karen MacDonald’s
show).
RED HOT PATRIOT should be a tour de force but curiously, the
Lyric production starts on a pretty low key with Ivins ruminating about the
subject of an article. She calls it “letting the idea steep.” Unfortunately the
play steeps for too long. Now I presume director Courtney O’Connor wanted to
build intensity in the piece by starting out slowly but “Kick-Ass” is in the
title for heaven sakes. We need to see Molly kicking it from the get-go. If you
don’t lasso the audience right up front, as Molly might have said, they’ll slip
away from you.
Perhaps if she had entered with a cowboy hat (She’s wearing
the boots) and some metaphorical guns a-blazing, we’d be more than happy to hop
on for the ride but the tepid material doesn’t heat up until pretty late in 75
minute show. The Engels drop lots of names and repeat lots of Ivins’ pithy
quotes (like “the trouble with Baptists is they don’t hold ‘em under water long
enough”) but there’s no story there…and no fire.
Here’s what works: When Mac Donald sits astride a chair to
give us “a history lesson,” she’s excited and engaged and so are we. And it’s a
nice touch when Ivins hears her beloved, departed dog calling her. (It reminded
me of the recent “controversial” headlines from Pope Francis about animals going
to heaven.) What did not work for me is the paraphrase of Tom Joad’s “Wherever
there’s a cop beatin’ up a guy, I’ll be there” or the peculiar, intrusive background
music intended to punch up a scene.
Ivins famously mocked the news business for “thriving on the
weird, the astonishing and the absurd.” Maybe that’s what’s lacking in the
Engels’ play: It’s too ordinary. I remember what she looked and sounded like
(on TV) and I’m sure that makes it much harder for an actor. She had both
democrats and republicans eating out of her hand. I would like to have heard
how she did it. But that’s just one opinion.
