"The Royal Family"
reminds us of something most people, even most theater aficionados, have forgotten: that George S. Kaufman was a great playwright. Like Arthur Miller, Kaufman's work has suffered by virtue of its very quality and accessibility: it's become the property of high school drama departments and community theaters, who can recognize an indestructible piece when they see one. Kaufman's great plays-the Pulitzer Prize-winning "You Can't Take It With You", for one-have developed the whiff of amateurishness, like a soufflé put in the refrigerator next to pastrami. His drawing-room spoof of the Barrymores, written in 1927 with Edna Ferber (another big talent now nearly forgotten), seems an unlikely project for Steppenwolf, a company better known for its mastery of Sam Shepherd. Yet, as the play is a valentine to the joys of a life in the theater, it's a fitting work for an ensemble with 25 years of stage work already behind it. Director Frank Galati directs the comedy with a sure touch, but he's even better at bringing out the elegiac quality of a play about the choices people make and what they cost.Led by ensemble members Amy Morton and Lois Smith, the cast makes the ludicrous goings-on of the Cavendish clan play as smoothly as Noël Coward but without the archness. As Miss Julie, the daughter/sister/mother who holds everything together, Morton-well, holds everything together. Her character is posing and preening and slapping her forehead, but Morton is genuinely there. What a pleasure to see the accomplished director of "Glengarry Glen Ross" on stage once more. Smith is delightful as matriarch Fanny, and her paean to an actor's life-the "message" moment of the play-sounds utterly heartfelt. David New perfectly embodies the fatuousness and self-dramatization of Julie's brother Tony, and his display of fencing skills is both comic and impressive. (Robin H. McFarquhar is Fight Director.) Everyone else is variously stodgy, put-upon or clueless, as the case may be and the occasion calls for.
The spectacular two-story set by James Schuette and the period-perfect costumes by Mara Blumenfeld are triumphs of the designer's art. It's so nice when the people with the best technological toys turn out also to be the ones with the best imagination.
The Royal Family is a lovely bit of fluff, a perfect celebration of spring.