Art at the Black Mountain Center for the Arts
One of the great comic performances of the local theater year is now exploding on the stage of the Gale Jackson Theatre at the Black Mountain Center for the Arts. Kevin Patrick Murphy, founder of the 12-year-old The Actor’s Center of Asheville, returns to the role of Yvan in the French play Art, by Yasmina Reza (God of Carnage), beautifully translated by English playwright Christopher Hampton. Murphy is the third of the play’s three characters to appear and at first seems the least consequential, but about midway through comes a monologue that steals the show and establishes that Yvan has more emotions roiling beneath his disheveled appearance than either of his ostensibly higher and mightier friends. It’s also just hysterically funny and delivered with incredible energy and spot-on timing.
On the surface, Art is about, well, “art.” Well-off dermatologist Serge (Robert Dale Walker) has just paid an enormous sum for a painting, described by his best friend Marc (Jeff Benninghofen) in the play’s opening lines as “a canvas about five foot by four: white. The background is white and if you screw up your eyes, you can make out some fine white diagonal lines.” (Or maybe you can’t.) Marc, an engineer of firm convictions firmly expressed, hates it. Yvan, who considers both Marc and Serge his best friends, is more tolerant— “which, of course, when it comes to relationships, is the worst thing you can be,” according to Marc.
And so Art is, as it progresses, less about art and more about friendship. It’s rousingly funny, but it has nothing I’d describe as a “punch line.” The humor flows from the personalities and situations, beginning right off as Marc scrutinizes Serge’s painting, and Serge scrutinizes Marc’s reaction — at first with no words at all. The audience sees what’s going on, recognizes the situation for countless similar moments in their own lives, and the laughter bubbles up. It continues nearly unabated for the play’s 90-minute length (no intermission), emerging from the growing tensions between the friends and from Reza’s smart, often-rapid-fire, never-pretentious dialogue.
The play doesn’t need my amateur endorsement, of course. In the 31 years since its Parisian debut, it’s been translated into 20-some languages, won the Tony for Best Play, and attracted A-list actors such as Albert Finney, Alan Alda, and Victor Garber. It’s been performed in Buncombe County before, perhaps most notably in September 2015 at Asheville Community Theatre’s 35below, also with Murphy as Yvan. A Broadway revival is running right now, with Bobby Cannavale as Marc, James Corden as Yvan, and Neil Patrick Harris as Serge. But I can’t imagine enjoying the New York show more than I did the Black Mountain production.
From left, Jeff Benninghofen, Kevin Patrick Murphy, and Robert Dale Walker in Art.
The three roles are perfectly cast. As Marc, Benninghofen is forceful and assured, speaking with the certainty and self-presumed charm of a natural politician — wielding his perfect smile (as white as that painting) like a scimitar to disarm anyone who disagrees. Serge believes he’s being equally firm, but Walker blends Serge’s self-delusion with both the hopefulness of someone seeking social approbation and the defensiveness of a convert to a cult where he’s not entirely sure he’s welcomed. (“Serge fancies himself as a collector,” as Marc puts it.) But is either man as implacable as he seems if their friendship is at stake?
Yvan tries to be the mediator, a task he fumbles just as he has apparently fumbled many things in his life, perhaps including his upcoming wedding — the other subject of contention among the three friends. The point here is less the characters’ stark differences from one another than their familiarity to everyone in the audience — we have all been each of these guys at different times in our lives.
The stage at the BMCA is not large, but director Henry Williamson III moves his cast around comfortably so the confines aren’t a hinderance. Most important, he keeps the vitriol sharp but not fatal, the speeches impassioned but not histrionic, always leaving some breathing room in case anyone should finally come to their senses.
The nearly all-white set, serving as all three men’s apartments at various times, is neatly conceived by Art Moore (with lighting by Tegan Anders) to complement the subjects at hand — each man, it turns out, has a painting in his home representing his self-image. But is it “art”?
Art runs Friday–Sunday through September 21. For tickets and more information, visit blackmountainarts.org.
(Photos courtesy of the Black Mountain Center for the Arts)
From left, Jeff Benninghofen, Kevin Patrick Murphy, and Robert Dale Walker in Art.
