The Off-Broadway Theatre Review: Conversations with Mother
By Ross
“I hate camp.” A plea made in the first few moments of the sentimental charmer written lovingly by playwright(er) Matthew Lombardo (Looped; High). It’s a clarifying statement almost every gay man can engage with, even those who didn’t have the same caring relationship with their mother that Lombardo seems to have had that he so expertly lays out in his new 85-minute play, Conversations With Mother. It begins in the 1970s, and over a well-timed tactful one act and a number of decades, he tracks a personal loving relationship that he had with his mother to the end.
There are lots of moments of gentle smiling and laughs that will be had inside off-Broadway’s Theater 555 on w42nd Street as the play, directed the care by Noah Himmelstein (Lincoln Center’s I Am Harvey Milk), rides easy through the years of interactions between the two. There’s not a lot of deeper learning to be had here between Bobbie, an attractive gay man, played adorably and honestly by Matt Doyle (Broadway’s Company), trying to find his way through the world as a writer and lover of problematic men, as his mother, Maria Collavechio, played to perfection by a very game Caroline Aaron (Amazon’s “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel“), stands nearby, ready with a loving, tough-love remark. She’s there, by her phone, ready and willing to engage and help out, even if her attachment is laced with a sharp wit and a warning or two, yet forever anchored in unconditional love and care. Inside this strongly orchestrated mother-son two-hander, the two actors find a strongly etched chemistry that registers, making us believe in the roughness of their relationship like so many others we’ve witnessed in films and on stage over the years. One can’t help but think about Lainie Kazan and Bette Midler’s mother-daughter relationship in the 1988 film, “Beaches“, or the more tense pairing of Estelle Getty/Ann Bancroft and Harvey Fierstein in his “Torch Song Trilogy“, but Lombardo finds his own way, even if many of the lines and jokes feel as old as vaudeville (even though they are new), with a gay sharpened edge and a relatively poorly played fluted twist in the end.
“That’s my cue!” she says, as we go from Bobby’s young boy fears to his adult-themed angst in some smartly crafted sections that are balanced and connecting. Yet this mother-gay-son team remains emotionally tightly bound, with numerous phone calls and forced meetings that lay out their growing adult dynamic with ease. Secrets, as most gay men know, are withheld, but in this pairing, only for so long, as Aaron’s mother character coaxes them out of her son in ways that border on loving guilt and passive aggressiveness. Yet we are hooked by their entwined acknowledgment that there is always more to tell. I was almost jealous of the unconditional love that was represented on that simple but thoughtfully designed stage, created by Wilson Chin (Broadway’s Cost of Living), with playful costumes by Ryan Park Williamstown’s Alien/Nation), specific lighting by Elizabeth Harper (Perelman Center’s Between Two Knees), a sharp sound design by John Gromada (Broadway’s Torch Song), backed by gentle projections by Caite Hevner (Broadway’s In Transit).
Their “mommy’s not mad” care for each other floats out well, with the knowing frustrated anger being held just under the surface until it boils over, without ever really causing a strong disruption. The dialogue is delivered with a clear affection that registers, even when things and the stage darken on one side or the other. Rupture and repair is their dance, with conversations anchored in serious love and insecure attachments, even if presented with maternal ramblings pushed to the edge with well-jabbed comic zingers. There is a tight sentimentality that hangs around on the edges as the banter rotates around a similar formula and some stereotypical constructs, including a strong push at heteronormative hopes and dreams. Still, the two actors, directed well by Himmelstein, manage to unleash the cliches without it ever feeling too sugary sweet or oppressively jarring. Grief and humor are both spooned into this gentle brew, and if it wasn’t so tightly paced, “Don’t get mad,” but I believe this new play might not have worked as well as it does, even when that plea is well reversed in the end. It’s not the most original of ideas, even with its timely ingredients, but in these capable hands, Conversations with Mother finds a strong rhythm that engages and makes me wish for a similar kind of alignment that this mother-son pairing has found.
