TOM TITUS -- Theater Review

If you don’t know much about art, but you know what you don’t like,

you’re going to love “Art” at South Coast Repertory.

Yasmina Reza’s biting commentary on culture and friendship --

translated from the French but undoubtedly losing few, if any, laughs in

the process -- is a brief but uproarious venture. At 90 minutes without

intermission, it may well be the funniest show you’ve seen all year, and

the year’s nearly extinct.

“Art” involves three friends -- a highbrow, a lowbrow and a

middlebrow, who serves as involuntary arbitrator. The sophisticate

purchases a huge painting, for a huge sum, that appears to the untrained,

or maybe even the trained, eye to be entirely white. He enlists his

friends’ opinions on his investment.

Those opinions touch the match to a verbal conflagration, which

quickly becomes a forest fire. Under the pinpoint direction of Mark

Rucker, the play steadily increases in outlandish hilarity, threatening

irreparable damage to the camaraderie of its characters.

“Art” is so well constructed that it’s difficult to imagine it not

succeeding under any circumstances. But in the hands of the three superb

actors on the SCR Mainstage, it’s, well, a work of art.

The subtle, and not so subtle, zingers come flying thick and fast,

creating an atmosphere of virtual nonstop hilarity.

Stephen Markle seethes with a sense of self-righteous superiority as

the dermatologist who’s bought the white-on-white painting. His

indignation at its reception is skillfully rendered, creating a climate

of intellectual tension that carries the production into uncharted waters

that may well engulf a friendship.

His severest critic is portrayed, in the richest performance of the

evening, by John de Lancie, who cuts through the cerebral clutter to

register his opinion repeatedly with a four-letter word unprintable in a

family newspaper. De Lancie functions as the motor of the production,

revving up the dissent and keeping it humming uproariously. His sharp,

sarcastic wit is a lethal weapon.

The erstwhile referee, cast in an uncomfortable role by both of the

others, is splendidly enacted by Steven Culp (son of the “I Spy” star),

who has problems of his own and hardly needs this controversy. Culp

engages the audience with a crackling monologue on the family problems

related to his impending marriage. It rambles on for a funny 10 minutes

as the others feign terminal boredom.

Singly, the “Art” cast is terrific. Together, they thrust and parry

with a finely honed comic vengeance that brings most of the audience to

its feet at the curtain. It’s a show that makes you yearn to see it again

and catch what you may have missed during the extended episodes of

laughter.

The high comedy is carried out against an imposing, oversized backdrop

by scenic designer Tony Fanning that resembles a museum more than a

private residence. It might dwarf a cast possessed of less-dynamic

interpretive skills.

No matter your opinions on modern art, or even the painting in

question at SCR, this work of “Art” should be immensely appreciated.

* TOM TITUS reviews local theater for the Daily Pilot. His reviews

appear Thursdays and Saturdays.

FYI

* WHAT: “Art”

* WHERE: South Coast Repertory, 650 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa

* WHEN: Tuesdays through Fridays at 8 p.m., Saturdays at 2:30 and 8

p.m., and Sundays at 2:30 and 7:30 p.m. until Nov. 19

* COST: $28 to $49

* CALL: (714) 708-5555