Casting a non-binary actor as a non-binary protagonist merits snaps, but the two-hour suspension of disbelief required of an audience by Neil Koenigsberg’s Wink sinks whatever good intentions may have prompted its playwright to put fingertips to keyboard.

Oscar-winning actor Dario Villanova (David Mingrino), a 60ish recovering alcoholic still reeling from the swimming-pool suicide of the gay teenage son he never acknowledged (the result of a long-ago liaison with his then-and-now Latina housekeeper), decides to atone for his sins by volunteering at a Hollywood center for LGBTQAI youth.

 There the faded, thrice-divorced Hollywood superstar meets 19-year-old aspiring artist Wink (Andrik Ochoa), with whom he instantly bonds over their shared love of 1950s doo-wop music, and promptly invites the androgynous youth to come spend the night at his mini-mansion (on a strictly platonic basis of course).

Not only that, but the morning after that very first encounter, Dario announces plans to hold a press conference and make public his intention to donate his entire (and apparently tax-&-agent’s-fee-free) $1,000,000 paycheck for the about-to-be-shot-in-Eastern-Europe slasher pic Slaughter, AKA The Romanian Senior Citizen Murder Project, to Replenishment House, the LGBTQAI center where he and Wink first met way back yesterday.

 Perhaps not surprisingly, this news does not sit well with Dario’s hotshot Hollywood agent Peter King (Adam Cardon), who perhaps not unreasonably deems his client’s loco plan as career suicide.

 Hunky Hispanic social worker Manuel Ortiz (Euriamis Losada), on the other hand, could not be happier about the impending donation to the center where he counsels at-risk youth even if that means he has to deal with Peter, who just happens in a city of four million to have been the homophobic bully who made Manny’s high school years a living hell.

 Fortunately for all concerned, leggy young African-American publicist Valerie Smith (Amy Argyle) is available to handle PR and try (along with everyone else in the play) to get it through Peter’s thick, genitalia-obsessed skull that it’s none of his business what equipment Wink is packing, a lesson the muscular, Neanderthal-minded agent so steadfastly refuses to learn that he attempts to grab some tactile proof, then cries assault when the waiflike Wink tries to resist.

If it’s not already obvious, subtlety is not Wink The Play’s middle name, nor is nuance, nor most importantly is believability, and not just because of plot absurdities, though had Koenigsberg allowed Dario and Wink’s mentor-mentee relationship to develop over a period of weeks or months, at the very least the financially downsized Hollywood superstar’s decision to donate an apparently much-needed seven-figure paycheck to charity might not seem quite so lunatic.

 Under Michael Allen Angel’s direction, the non-binary Ochoa makes for a luminous Wink, a performance that would be better served had  the character been written to have learned English as a young adult and not supposedly since his birth in the Bronx.

As for Dario, while a William F. Macy, Bryan Cranston, or Dennis Quaid might have made for a credibly charismatic, Best Supporting Actor Oscar-caliber movie star, try as he might, Mingrino does not.

 Among supporting players, the hot and handsome Losada (a young Ricky Martin with natural acting gifts) fares best as Manuel, Cardon has his moments as the two-dimensionally written Peter, and Argyle displays beauty and talent in equal measure as a character saddled with a sudden, credibility-defying journey into nutso land.

 At the very least, Wink sports a stylish look on Pete Hickok’s versatile set thanks in large part to Katerina Pagsolingan’s backdrop projections, a mix of color photography, animation, and multi-hued chalk art, with additional design kudos shared by Wendell C. Carmichael (costumes), Matt Richter (lighting), and Jesse Mandapat (sound). Doug Oliphant choreographs a brief fight sequence.

Wink is produced by Racquel Lehrman, Theatre Planners. Misha Riley, Theatre Planners, is assistant producer. Danny Crisp is production stage manager. Casting is by Michael Donovan, CSA. Richie Ferris is casting associate.

While playwright Koenigsberg warrants snaps for putting a genderqueer character centerstage, as does his play’s West Coast Premiere for casting a non-binary actor in its title role, LGBTQAI youth (and L.A. theatergoers) deserve far better than Wink.

Zephyr Theatre, 7456 Melrose Avenue, Los Angeles.
www.Plays411.com/Wink

–Steven Stanley
December 28, 2018
Photos: Ed Krieger

Tags: Los Angeles Theater Review, Neil Koenigsberg, Zephyr Theatre