A PUBLIC READING OF AN UNPRODUCED SCREENPLAY ABOUT THE DEATH OF WALT DISNEY

There may well be a compelling play to be written about Walt Disney’s life, but Lucas Hnath’s A Public Reading of An Unproduced Screenplay About the Death of Walt Disney is not that play.

Hnath’s titular conceit is that group of actors have gathered in a sparsely furnished rehearsal room to read aloud an autobiographical script focusing on Walt (Kevin Ashworth) and his relationships with brother Roy (Thomas Piper), daughter Diane (Brittney Bertier), and son-in-law Ron (Cory Washington)

An intriguing premise this may be, but A Public Reading of An Unproduced Screenplay About the Death of Walt Disney is written in so stilted a manner that the end result is a mixed bag at best.

 A series of ten scenes take us from Walt’s decision to branch out from animated features into a series of science documentaries, to his plans to build a utopian city in Florida, to the onset of the lung cancer that would soon take his life, to his relationships with a daughter who insisted she would never name a son “Walt,” to the urban legend that maintains that Disney was cryogenically frozen (or that at least that a part of him was).

All this is well and good, and food for something far more gripping than the play Hnath has written, one hampered again and again by stylization taken to the extreme.

Take these lines of dialog between Walt and Roy early on in the play and try to imagine having to direct the two actors playing these roles, or having to play either of the roles yourself. (The lack of capitalization and punctuation is Hnath’s.)

WALT: And they all say, well, he does cartoons ROY: they? WALT: say ROY: about WALT: me ROY: okay WALT: it’s like ROY: they like WALT: sure ROY: everything you do is so WALT: likeable ROY: so wonderful about WALT: but not so ROY: it’s good WALT: important ROY: makes money WALT: really like to, need to, should do ROY: something different WALT: a little, I guess, I would say, I am thinking ROY: more WALT: expanding ROY: where WALT: into the real world ROY: … WALT: … ROY: …oh … that

A playwright’s note has Hnath instructing his actors to “let lines flow seamlessly from one to the next” and to “never let it get staccato,” but good luck doing that with dialog like the excerpt I’ve quoted.

To his credit, director Peter Richards does ensure a good deal of visual variety in a play that is essentially a “table read,” aided in large part by Matt Richter’s endlessly varied lighting, and by David Offner’s authentic rehearsal room set, one that offers a mid-play surprise.

And cast members do do their darndest to make their characters as true-to-life as Hnath’s script allows them to be, with Ashworth in particular adding multiple shades to a not-so-sympathetic Walt, and Bertier revealing the pain of a daughter with far from the world’s greatest dad.

But there’s only so much an actor can do.

Sound designer Jesse Mandapat does add some nifty effects along the way, Kate Bergh’s four costumes are just right for a play reading, Jenine MacDonald’s props (including a handkerchief with the words “a lot of blood” written on it) are reading-appropriate as well, a flip-phone suggesting the table read takes place in a post-Walt, pre-iPhone era.

Best of all are Nick Santiago’s scene-setting projections, especially those that take advantage of Mickey Mouse’s image being in the public domain.

Casting is by Michael Donovan, CSA and Richie Ferris, CSA. Understudies Valerie Larsen, Piper, Richards, and James Tolbert perform on April 15 and 17.

Chloe Willey is production stage manager and Lyanne Low is assistant stage manager. Hayden Kirschbaum is assistant lighting designer. Lucy Pollak is publicist.

A Public Reading of an Unproduced Screenplay About the Death of Walt Disney is produced by Racquel Lehrman, Theatre Planners. Misha Riley, Theatre Planners is associate producer.

 A play best described as an oddity, A Public Reading of an Unproduced Screenplay About the Death of Walt Disney is not without its moments. Still, even at a brief 70 minutes, Lucas Hnath’s play feels about twice as long.

Odyssey Theatre, 2055 South Sepulveda Boulevard, Los Angeles.
www.Onstage411.com/Disney

–Steven Stanley
March 27, 2022
Photos: Jenny Graham

 

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