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Theater Mystery Date The Dirty Talk Remounting a play that originated at the New York International Fringe Festival is a dicey proposition. As the budgets, venues, and ticket prices grow bigger, so do expectations. More often than not, the production loses the subversive fringiness that lent its vigor in the first place, and disappointment prevails. So when the creators of “The Dirty Talk,” the two-man psychodramedy that garnered a modicum of acclaim at FringeNYC 2005, decided to restage the work, they shrewdly sidestepped the usual pitfalls. Their strategy? Showcase it at Center Stage, an off-off Broadway space downtown, restrain ticket prices, and keep as much of the original team intact as possible. Sidney Williams and Kevin Cristaldi reprise their roles, and Padraic Lillis returns to direct. By hewing to the pared-down formula of the original, the work retains its punch by fixing the focus where it belongs—the power-shifting pas de deux between two very different men as they struggle to find common ground. With a play about two guys alone in a cabin called “The Dirty Talk,” you might expect a racy homosexual tryst—and technically you’d be right—but it’s anything but predictable. Taking place real-time in a dumpy hunting cabin in the mountains of New Jersey, an irate Mitch (Williams) finds himself soaked and stranded with Lino (Cristaldi) during a raging thunderstorm. With the car’s engine flooded and the phone on the fritz, the two 35-year olds are forced to come to grips with such thorny issues as self-deception, emasculation, and sexual deviance. Playwright Michael Puzzo has crafted an urbane, barbed thriller that doles out tidbits of narrative bit by bit, leaving us hungry for the next. Normally humdrum questions, such as “Who are these guys? Why are they here? How did they meet?” take on an edgy urgency. With his Pabst Blue Ribbon paunch and receding hairline, the homophobic Mitch is the type of guy who thinks the work “fuckin’” is an adjective. Williams could have played him as one-note wiseacre schlub who might have strayed from the set of a must-see TV sitcom—a topic that he makes fun of. Instead, he makes Mitch, who starts to split apart at the seams before our eyes, affably endearing. Yet it’s Cristaldi’s portrayal of a pervert with a heart that’s truly riveting. The skinny, social outcast Lino, with his fashion-backward mustache and knit cap, wasn’t picked last at gym class because he wasn’t even picked at all. With his facial tics and hands squirming in the pockets of his “slacks,” he’s clearly damaged but still exudes an air of “I am what I am” defiance. Mitch, on the other hand, crazed by Lino’s deception, wields his anger to mask his all-consuming insecurities. Who is the real freak, here? Puzzo’s sharp dialogue reverberates. To Mitch’s claim that deer hunting isn’t about killing living things because “it’s just a sport,” Lino deadpans, “Yeah, a sport the other team doesn’t know it’s playing.” When Lino says, “You are not exactly the man I thought you were going to be,” that’s just what Mitch’s ex-wife said before she bolted. As Mitch describes her fascination with the weather—a dominant theme in “The Dirty Talk”—and how she was “awestruck by something so, so, common,” he could very well be describing our take on this unassuming production. The macho logs-gone-wild cabin set, devised by Robert Monaco, features a smarmy waterbed and a “decapitated” head of a deer, who seems happy to be mounted on the wall, high above the beastly drama unfolding below. Also noteworthy is Elizabeth Rhodes’ sound and Sarah Sidman’s lighting, which dutifully create the requisite stormy creepiness. As directed by Lillis, this taut, briskly paced drama runs only 80 minutes without intermission. While I admire the playwright’s instinct to resist a tidy climax, the ending feels abrupt and incomplete. Some of the questions raised throughout the proceedings are left hanging. And for those who hope the action gets as dirty as some of the talk, you’ll be disappointed, but just for a moment.
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