TT: Didja hear the one about the hunchback?

In today’s Wall Street Journal I report on two shows, the Old Vic’s Richard III in San Francisco and the Broadway premiere of Relatively Speaking. Both are disappointments. Here’s an excerpt.
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The smartest thing that Kevin Spacey ever did was scale back his film career in order to become the artistic director of London’s Old Vic. Though he’s a gifted actor, his range is narrow, and his brief run as a Hollywood leading man was something of a fluke. Not only is the stage his natural habitat, but “Richard III” appears at first glance to be well suited to his knack for playing unhappy men who despise themselves. Sam Mendes, who directed Mr. Spacey in “American Beauty,” is at the helm of this production, the latest installment in the Old Vic’s Bridge Project, which will come to New York’s BAM Harvey Theatre in January. Would that it were worth waiting for, but it doesn’t come off, and it looks like both men are equally to blame.
Mr. Spacey turns Shakespeare’s villainous hunchback-king into a monochromatic monster in a leg brace, by turns sarcastic, petulant and supercilious. He shoots for and gets plenty of laughs, an approach that can work–it worked for John Douglas Thompson in Shakespeare & Company’s 2010 production–but Mr. Spacey, unlike Mr. Thompson, is not a classical actor, and his voice lacks the color and amplitude necessary to bring Shakespeare’s verse to life. Too often he resorts to ranting, and the fact that he is surrounded by a first-class supporting cast draws further attention to his limitations….
Mr. Mendes has his own limitations. I haven’t much cared for the unpoetic, self-consciously clever Shakespeare productions that he’s previously mounted as part of the Bridge Project, and this modern-dress “Richard III” is in many ways all of a piece with the “Tempest” and “Winter’s Tale” that preceded it. No sooner do you walk into the theater than you see the word NOW projected in huge letters on the back wall of the set. That’s just what Mr. Mendes gives us, a fast shuffle through the stock Shakespeare-our-contemporary clichés…
It isn’t hard to see why the producers of “Relatively Speaking” thought it would be a smart idea to bring to Broadway a triple bill of one-act comedies by Woody Allen, Ethan Coen and Elaine May. Big names fill seats, and if your target market is retirement-age New Yorkers, Mr. Allen and Ms. May are more than big enough to do the job all by themselves, with Mr. Coen as a special added attraction for somewhat younger nihilists. The theory is impeccable, the results disastrous….
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Read the whole thing here.