Dolphin in the Dark

By T.E.K.

WELCOME TO ANDROMEDA and VARIETY OBIT by RON WHYTE

More evenings than not, that aisle-anchored creature the drama critic peers out over a becalmed stage, stagnant characters and dialogue indistinguishable from soggy debris. But on occasion the sight of fresh and genuine talent greets his eye, and the stage seems to quiver with dramatic life.

Such a talent is Ron Whyte, 27, who is making his playwriting debut with these two off-Broadway playlets. Let's mark him for a dolphin who cavorts in drama as if it were his native element. He writes with humor, grace and eloquence, and he creates characters who refuse to leave the playgoer's memory.

The lesser item, Variety Obit, is a kind of songs-and-patter snapshot history of the U.S. from the Puritans to the present as recorded by a vaudeville clan. While the music by Mel Marvin is pleasant and the lyrics by Bob Satuloff are plaintively evocative, the retrospective vision does not cohere.

Welcome to Andromeda is another matter. The hero (David Clennon) is one of nature's ignominious errors. He is totally paralyzed except for his fingers and his head. His bed is a movable crypt. On his 21st birthday, his mother, a vampire bat whom we never see but whose oppressive presence empties the room of breathable air, has gone off to buy him some presents. She has left him in the care of a Southern nurse (Bella Jarrett). She, it develops, is an alcoholic who once gave a patient the wrong medicine. He, it develops, wants the wrong medicine -- death -- as surcease from sorrow. He is caustic; she is dumb. They are both anguished spirits, with a scarifying lack of control over the lethal game they are playing.

If one is to guess at Ron Whyte's intent, it is that he wants us to look at two people spinning on the charred cinders of this planet who may be saying to themselves: "Look, the abyss over which you lean is yourself. The pain you feel is just as unendurable as you think it is. The jokes you make as a fencer against fate merely underline your epitaph." If so, the playwright may count his luck as equal to his talent, for one can scarcely imagine more gifted and sensitive actors than David Clennon and Bella Jarrett for conveying his purpose and his vision.

--:T.E.K.

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