Thursday, the New York Comic-Con opened. I have not been to one of these in quite a while and they've swelled to the capacity of the Jacob Javits Convention Center, which is apparently around 25% greater than a responsible Fire Marshall would allow.
For years now, folks who somehow think I am the Complaint Department for Comic-Con International in San Diego have been showering me with a list of gripes that fall roughly into three categories…
- "It's too crowded!"
- "It's too expensive to go to it!"
- "There's not enough there about the particular stuff that interests me!"
Taking these in reverse order: The usual answer to (3) is that either you're not looking hard enough or you're interested in things that simply don't attract enough of an audience. (2) may be valid to some but there are a lot of things in this world that we can't afford and that ain't gonna change. Which brings us to (1)…
Let me head off the e-mails saying, "You don't experience this problem because you're a Guest of Honor at Comic-Con." Yeah, that has its benefits (as well as a few drawbacks) but it doesn't help one bit at things like physically getting in the door, making one's way down aisles or across the floors, etc. If there was a line to get into the lavatory, I would have to wait in it just like any person without a little extra ribbon on their badge.
As it turns out, I've never once had to wait in line in San Diego to get into a room that says MEN on the door. I can't recall that happening at any comic convention in the 47 years I've been going to comic and science-fiction conventions…except this current con here in New York. The lines to buy food are even worse — and again, a Guest of Honor badge would not help anyone with that.
I have other such complaints but they're not so much about the convention but about the Javits Center. Presumably, they have a certain stated capacity that is endorsed by the aforementioned Fire Marshall. Presumably, the operators of this con sell memberships and exhibitor space up to that capacity. To get into the con, one must "tap in" with one's RFID badge…so unless Russians are hacking the computers that tally such things, there's no mistaking how many people are being allowed into the premises.
So as a veteran convention-goer, my sense is that that "stated capacity" is way too high for the physical limitations of the building. Except in San Diego when I've made the foolish mistake of venturing near the videogame companies' booths, I can't recall ever having so much trouble getting down aisles. Many of the videogame companies actively try to clog those aisles, holding contests and demonstrations designed to get people to crowd around, the better to suggest they have the hottest new game in the hall. There's some of that in the Javits Center this weekend but I think there are just too many people in that building.
That may not be the case at future New York Cons. The Javits Center is plastered with signs promising further expansion will increase the exhibitor space by up to five-fold. That would be great and I'm thinking I might not be back until some of that happens. As it is, it's Saturday, the con opened at 10 and I'm sitting here in our hotel room thinking, "I'm not scheduled for any panels or signings today. I have to be there tomorrow but maybe Amber and I will skip today."
Thursday evening, Amber and I dined at Sardi's with my friends Jim Brochu and Steve Schalchlin. I'll tell you about Jim and Steve when I write about Monday when we'll be seeing them again. Then the lovely Amber and I hiked over to the Lyceum Theater to see The Play That Goes Wrong, which is a British import that is, quite intentionally, a play that goes wrong.
What goes wrong with it? Everything. You would be hard-pressed to think of any disaster that can happen on a stage, apart maybe from me getting up to sing, that does not happen onstage at the Lyceum. The problems begin even before the play does. If you go, come early so you can watch the alleged stage crew (actually, actors playing the stage crew) screw things up before they begin a performance of The Murder at Haversham Manor, presented by the Cornley University Drama Society.
The Murder at Haversham Manor is the kind of thing Agatha Christie might have written if she was loopy on Nyquil and/or had been repeatedly hit on the head with a ball peen hammer. Due to every single person involved in the production being inept, something happens every fifteen seconds which would not have seemed out of place in a Three Stooges short. Lines are flubbed. Props malfunction. People trip. Portions of the set attack the actors. The screw-ups are relentless and just get worse and worse.
The actors are superb — and I'm referring to the actual skilled actors themselves, not the incompetent actors they portray. The physical comedy is such that every one of them deserves a Tony Award just for being able to do this thing eight times a week. I cannot imagine the practice and physical training necessary to play some of those roles. The real stage crew also must have the hardest jobs on all of Broadway, keeping up with the split-second timing, causing this to explode or that to collapse at the precise instant it has to explode or collapse.
All of this brings us to the question, "How hilarious is this?" Here is the most honest answer I can give you: About 85% of the audience howled from the moment the curtain did not go up until the moment the actors stumbled on their final bows. The remaining 15% sat there, impressed by the effort and skill but seriously not laughing.
The second act begins with the director/star of The Murder at Haversham Manor coming out in front of the curtain and thanking those who did not leave at intermission. It was a joke but in truth, a lot of the 15% did depart, including the folks sitting in front of and behind Amber and me. I had contemplated doing likewise because I was in that 15%.
I don't think I laughed once. Not once…and this is me, a lover of Buster Keaton and Laurel & Hardy and the Stooges and It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and other enterprises that you'd think would make me an ideal appreciator of this kind of thing. I may just be able to explain why…
Throughout the show, my mind kept going back to two plays, both of which were about things going wrong on stage during a play. One, which was mentioned by most reviewers of The Play That Goes Wrong, was the 1982 Noises off by Michael Frayn. The other was a similar play which I thought was superior but not as widely-hailed. That was Footlight Frenzy by Ron House, Diz White, Alan Shearman and Bud Slocumb. The two plays were a great example of how different folks can have pretty much the same idea at the same time. If one had seriously preceded the other, someone would have charged plagiarism.
In both Noises off and Footlight Frenzy, we get to know the actors and why they're inept and what's going on between them of a personal nature. There are reasons why things go awry in the plays we then see them attempt to perform and there are repercussions in their lives for their performances being such messes. In The Play That Goes Wrong, what goes wrong just goes wrong because it goes wrong and all that happens is that they get humiliated and almost killed during the play and we don't even know who those actors are or why it matters.
So that's (I think) why I was so unmotivated to laughter. I stayed because I admired the expertise, the way you might not laugh at a superb acrobat but you're still entertained by the performance. I also stayed because as a writer, I wanted to see how they'd destroy the rest of the set. In that regard, they did not disappoint.
I am not not recommending this play for you. Odds are you'd be in the 85% who laugh and cheer throughout. I will suggest though that if you want to see it, you get to New York to do so…and it may still be running in London for all I know. It requires such skill from its performers and stage crew, and that set's gotta cost a fortune, that I doubt you'll see this done at your local community college. They certainly can't do a better job than the folks doing it — eight times a week, unbelievably — over on 45th Street near Times Square.