The cast of Private Eyes, Richard Conolly, Nikki Marie, Erin Galloway, Cara Kluver and Richard Osborn are ready to entertain you.
Photo: RICH SCMITT
By LIBBY MOTIKA
Circling the News Contributor
In Shakespeare’s “Hamlet,” the mourning Hamlet commissioned a play that pantomimes the murder of his father by his uncle to “catch the conscience of the king.”
It is a very human inclination to unearth an uncomfortable truth though the use of metaphor. We are loath to confront a friend or lover, whom we suspect has betrayed us. We can’t let ourselves believe it.
Steven Dietz’s play Private Eyes, on stage at Pierson Playhouse, uses the time-honored play-within-a-play device to tackle the painful subject of marriage and adultery.
The play opens with Lisa (Cara Kluver), who is applying for a job as a waitress. Café owner Matthew (Erin Galloway), underwhelmed with her skills, sits down pretending to be customer so she can try again.
The audience, eager to see what happens next, is caught short. This is just a rehearsal for a play, and Lisa and Matthew are married.
The vignette prepares us for the uncertainty that lies ahead. The couple are indeed actors preparing for a new play directed by the famously manipulative director Adrian (Richard Conolly).
The play they’re rehearsing mirrors their own real-life situation. It’s about a director having an affair with a married actress. The audience is never sure whether the scene we’re watching is from the “real” story or from the play within the play.
Lisa is having an affair. Maybe. Or it might be in Matthew’s mind. The clues are all there that Lisa is having an affair. But, then again, it might just be part of a play that the couple is in. Who knows?
Matthew sees indications that his wife is having an affair but doesn’t want to believe it. Self-deception. For their part, Lisa and Adrian decide to tell Matthew the truth, but then again, because their love affair is over, no need to tell the truth.
Private Eyes does not unfold in sequence. We go back to the beginning and slowly discover the essence of play: secrecy and deception. Dietz’s characters try to tell the truth but along the way learn the value of a “the comforting little lie.”
The author, Dietz, offers his discourse on long-term marriage by having Matthew wonder whether the only thing that will get a bored partner’s attention is something hurtful, adultery maybe? He and Lisa sense the surprise missing from their lives. “I think you’re gorgeous” in the morning just doesn’t do it anymore, so is the only surprise left to say, “I’m having an affair?”
“We all desire,” Dietz said in a 1998 interview. “But we fill our lives with the complexity to avoid the terrifying fact of simply having someone you want to be with.”
Given its complex structure, the play is sometimes confusing, especially in the early scenes before the audience catches on. But director Michael Keith Allen adroitly guides the superb cast through the labyrinth of the playwright’s imagination.
“Steven Dietz holds mirror up to the face of society, using humor as his primary tool,” said Jennifer Stewart, who directed the play in a 1999 production. “Only comedy can make us realize the truths we are not fond of.”
Private Eyes continues at Theatre Palisades Pierson Playhouse through December 15, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. Contact: (310) 454-1970.
Cara Kluver and Erin Galloway examine their marriage in Private Eyes.
Photo: RICH SCHMITT