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MR. MARMALADE Laura Pels Theatre, 111 W. 46th St. (212) 719-1300. Through Jan. 20.
SOME plays are good, some plays are bad, and some plays are just irritating as hell. The last is definitely true of "Mr. Marmalade," marking actor Michael C. Hall's return to the New York stage after his five-year stint on the acclaimed HBO series "Six Feet Under." A viciously dark comedy depicting the troubled inner lives of pre-pubescent children, this play by Noah Haidle substitutes shock for insight, vulgarity for wit.
Mr. Marmalade, played by Hall, is the imaginary friend of Lucy (Mamie Gummer), a precocious, to say the least, 4-year-old living with her single mother (Virginia Louise Smith). Lucy is not not exactly your average tyke: Upon hearing that her babysitter is having her boyfriend over, she warns "I hope you use protection." And when she plays doctor with her suicidal 5-year-old friend Larry (Paolo Schrieber), she asks him if he has health insurance before giving him a, um, highly intimate physical examination. Her friend Mr. Marmalade is a chain-smoking, hard-drinking vulgarian whose idea of being nice is asking Lucy if she'd like some of the cocaine he's vigorously snorting.
Even while Lucy and Larry are getting closer - they have a dinner date where he provides a sumptuous repast of Fruit Loops and Twinkies - she continues to further her relationship with Mr. Marmalade. Eventually, they even get married and have a baby, although his drunken, abusive behavior leads to a shocking act of violence straight out of a Greek tragedy.
The play's premise, while imaginative and provocative, is both unconvincing and highly repetitive in its execution, with playwright Haidle unable to provide more than one-note variations on his theme. And his attempts at stylization, such as the cutesy titles that preface each scene, have a tendency to backfire, as evidenced by the spontaneous burst of applause from the relieved audience when they were informed that they were about to witness "The final scene in the play."
Director Michael Greif has provided a properly absurdist staging, with Allen Moyer's colorful, childlike set designs adding further to the hallucinatory atmosphere. But the performers are clearly struggling with their roles, with Gummer and Schreiber uneasily walking the line between childhood and adulthood and Hall failing to invest his character with the charm necessary to offset his monstrousness. The supporting players fare better, with David Costabile finding some terrific moments as Mr. Marmalade's put-upon subordinate.
At one point, the title character wields a formidable looking device dubbed the "SuckBlow 2000" and proceeds to use it to blow away the detritus on the stage left over from the previous scene. Would that the audience could come to the Laura Pels Theater similarly armed.
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