LONDON CALLING. HANG UP

By Richard Zoglin

Anyone who has done much theatergoing in London knows the feeling: sitting in the stalls at a half-empty matinee and watching an actor you've barely heard of--or maybe the understudy of an actor you've barely heard of--command the stage with the sort of assurance and effortless technical skill that elude even big-name stars in America. It's better training; it's Shakespeare; it's being able to work constantly to develop your craft--whatever the reason, British actors really are better.

Michael Gambon is one of the best, though American audiences have seen little of him. Acclaimed for his work in everything from Uncle Vanya to several of Alan Ayckbourn's most provocative comedies (A Chorus of Disapproval, Man of the Moment), Gambon is known here mainly as the star of Dennis Potter's admired TV mini-series, The Singing Detective. Now he's making his long-overdue U.S. stage debut, in a Broadway production of David Hare's Skylight. All the ingredients are there for stage magic; unfortunately, too many of the wires and trapdoors are clearly visible.

Hare's plays usually teem with ideas and political passion. He took on the British justice system in Murmuring Judges, postwar disillusion in Plenty, the church in Racing Demon. Skylight is a more modest piece, essentially a two-character drama about a wealthy restaurateur who arrives at the bleak little flat of his former mistress and tries to rekindle their affair. First we learn, rather tediously, the background of their relationship: they met when she went to work at one of his restaurants; she left him three years ago; his wife has since died of cancer. Then, after some getting-reacquainted sex, the fissures reappear. He complains dismissively about her freezing flat ("You can take hostages and tell them this is Beirut"); she excoriates him for not appreciating her work as an inner-city teacher. This predictable feint at class conflict, however, doesn't bring to life a relationship that fails ever to involve us. Why were these two together in the first place? Could they ever be together again? These are questions we don't walk away asking; this well-crafted, unsurprising play closes a circle before we have a chance to get inside.

The play's spareness leaves the audience with entirely too much time to admire the acting. There is certainly plenty to admire about Gambon: the resonant baritone, the fleshy, middle-aged face that can shed years in one high-spirited moment, his improbable lightness on his feet. Yet each bit of physical business--an almost coquettish kick back of one leg, a sudden palsy in his hand as he breaks into sobs--seems too italicized, as if to announce: Great Acting Present. Gambon's unheralded co-star, Lia Williams (who also played the role in London), gets closer to our hearts without nearly as much effort.

Director Richard Eyre adds a couple of jarring physical outbursts (she angrily flings a load of silverware; a bit later he scatters a pile of books), but Hare hasn't pulled his weight. Glad to have you, Mr. Gambon; bring an Ayckbourn play the next time you're in town.

--By Richard Zoglin