The Retributionists - a new play in previews

This afternoon I saw a preview performance of a new play by Daniel Goldfarb, "The Retributionists," at Playwrights Horizons, an off-Broadway venue on West 42nd Street in Manhattan.  Leigh Silverman directed a cast of seven.  

Since this was a preview of a play that will open officially on September 14, I really should not say too much about the quality of the performance, which I expect will receive some tinkering from the director and cast between now and the opening.  And I shouldn't drop lots of plot spoilers, either, so I'll just give the general concept here. 

During World War II, a group of Jewish ghetto refugees are hiding out in the woods as partisans, raiding Nazi targets, when their leader has the inspiration to hold them together - a determination that when the war is over, they will bring about retribution against the German people.  This is depicted in a flashback scene at the beginning of the second act.  The play itself mainly concerns the attempted execution of the retribution scheme in 1946, in the context of strained and interrelated emotional attractions and repulsions of the four leading characters, who are played by Margarita Levieva, Adam Rothenberg, Cristin Milioti, and Adam Driver, in order of appearance.

I don't care for the use of the delayed flashback scene here.  I like my stories to be told in chronological order - I'm just old-fashioned that way.  The flashback scene does add something in terms of fleshing out the characters and their relationships, but almost all of it has been signaled during the first act, so in some sense it seems superfluous.  I also thought that the second act was too long, and jettisoning this flashback scene - while building in necessary elements of it elsewhere - would help to tighten things. Perhaps it could even be placed at the beginning of the first act, in chronological order.  That would make the balance of the first act much more comprehensible.  I also found my attention wandering during the bakery scene in the second act.

The four leads all undoubtedly have plenty of work to do on their characters between now and the opening, but I found in particular the character of Jascha, played by Adam Rothenberg, to be pretty well formed at this point.  Mr. Rothenberg has a striking physical presence.  I was interested to see that the other male lead, Adam Driver, was just in another off-Broadway show, which I saw at Rattlestick Theater several weeks ago, "Slipping," in which he was really marvelously effective, and I imagine by the time "The Retributionists" opens, he will have sharpened his role considerably.  This role is quite different from the one he played in the other show, and at first I didn't even recognize him as the character is so different.  The two female leads were, I thought, less far along than the male leads in figuring out and inhabiting their characters, but it is early days with three weeks to opening...

The plotting is a bit convoluted at times, in terms of emotional interrelationships, and some plot twists in the second act left me a bit puzzled at first.  Maybe playwright Goldfarb still has some revising to do as well.  The production seemed effective - sets, lighting, costumes - and the three supporting roles in the second act were well taken.

I think this is likely to shape up into something interesting, and I recommend seeing it a bit closer to opening, if not soon thereafter.  Certainly it is thought-provoking, and considerable dramatic tension is generated at key moments.

Comments

[Art Leonard]

This week's issue of the NY "Jewish Week", in an article about the new Tarantino flick about a Jewish military unit during WWII targeting Germans for retribution, discusses the historical record on retributionist activities. In the course of that, it describes the actual incidents on which this play is based. When I attended the play, I thought it was basically a work of fiction, but it appears to have been based on real incidents. Fascinating!