Enron (The SOB Review)
Enron (The SOB Review) - Broadhurst Theatre, New York, New York***1/2 (out of ****)
Too big to fail?
Too soon?
Even more quickly than corporate giant Enron collapsed nearly ten years ago, the Broadway show bearing its name has already posted its closing notice for this Sunday, May 9.
That came just hours after this year's slate of Tony nominations were announced. While British import Enron earned a respectable four nods, including almost improbably (but deservedly) in the Best Original Score category for its playwright Lucy Prebble and sound designer Adam Cork, the captivating thrill ride of a play with music failed to win any nods in the Best Play, Best Direction of a Play (Rupert Goold) and Best Lead Actor in a Play (Norbert Leo Butz) categories. So for a show about failure, it seemed to be living up to its name.
But hold on a minute.
I for one regret not writing enthusiastically about this highly stylized gem of a show earlier. In my humble estimation, this breathtaking work should have been nominated in each of the aforementioned categories. But I sensed that Tony nominators, if not New Yorkers in general, are weary of all things Wall Street, let alone allusions to 9/11, which is a shame because we cannot afford to have the complete collapse of either our economy or other towers ever occur again.
Perhaps we just don't like being lectured by the British, although I submit we can learn a lot from our mother country. In Enron, Prebble slyly portrays the slippery slope of self-deception onto which the company's principals placed themselves, beginning with the disingenuous mark to market accounting principles right through the creation of the deceptive LJM. Prebble presents plausible rationales, however deluded, under which Jeffrey Skilling (Butz), Andy Fastow (an exceptional Stephen Kunken) and ultimately Kenneth Lay (Gregory Itzin) were operating.
Butz, as you've never seen him before, is particularly brilliant in his first truly dramatic role on Broadway. Nailing the quirky behavior of an industry wonk, it's simply astonishing to watch his metamorphosis into a ruthless would-be titan. Despite what the nominators have said, I thought his to be the best performance I've yet to see him deliver on stage. Butz is a fierce force with whom to be reckoned.
As for reckoning, Wall Street would do well to remember the phrase coined by Spanish philosopher George Santayana's that, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." Lucy Prebble's Enron should be required viewing for everyone associated with Wall Street. If it actually were, the show would be running for years.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
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Labels: Adam Cork, Broadway, Closing Notices, Enron, Lucy Prebble, Norbert Leo Butz, Play, Rupert Goold, Stephen Kunken, The SOB Review
posted by Steve On Broadway (SOB) @ Wednesday, May 05, 2010
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