Review: Dark side of Walt Disney brought to weird life in Lucas Hnath’s drama, now playing in L.A.

Lucas Hnath, one of the crucial creative American playwrights working immediately, doesn’t do stage biopics. But from early on in his profession, his performs have revolved round well-known figures.

The checklist of illustrious personages consists of Isaac Newton (“Isaac’s Eye”), Hillary and Invoice Clinton (“Hillary and Clinton”), and Anna Nicole Smith (within the quick audio drama “The Courtship of Anna Nicole Smith”). In “A Doll’s Home, Half 2,” his best-known work, he boldly picks up the story of Nora from Henrik Ibsen’s landmark drama “A Doll’s Home.”

Hnath even wrote a documentary play about his personal mom, although nobody would confuse “Dana H.” with a standard memoir. His technique, which leaves a visual hole between actor and function, is extra Brechtian. Slightly than assemble the biographical components right into a dramatic complete, he deconstructs the way in which life tales are normally packaged. Hnath, a dramaturgical dandy, fashions a playwriting type that by no means lets us lose sight of the inventive lens.

On the heart of “A Public Studying of an Unproduced Screenplay Concerning the Loss of life of Walt Disney,” Hnath’s 2013 play receiving its West Coast premiere in a Working Barn Productions presentation on the Odyssey Theatre, is the genius behind Mickey Mouse and Disneyland. The self-esteem is that we’re at a studying of a screenplay about Walt Disney written by Walt Disney himself.

Set round a convention desk, the play affords a portrait not of an avuncular artist whose childlike creativeness took over the world however of a megalomaniac who can’t brook dissent. The tone is jauntily damning. Embedded in an experimental comedy is the story of a tragic overreacher, a mortal who has come to imagine a godlike dominion over the remainder of the planet.

Hnath’s Walt (Kevin Ashworth) is in a race towards dying. The nagging backache for which he pops colourful drugs from a jar on his desk seems to be one thing way more nefarious.

At his facet is his brother Roy (Thomas Piper), who wears a bandage on his brow as a logo maybe of his browbeaten fraternal id. He’s chargeable for executing Walt’s fanciful visions. However more and more, he’s charged with reining in Walt’s runaway ambition — and bearing the brunt of his despotism.

Not happy with creating leisure, Walt is set to depart his imprint on actuality itself. As a substitute of constructing one other theme park, he needs to create his personal futuristic metropolis, a brand new model of Plato’s Republic wherein he’s the founding Thinker King.

Additionally on the desk are Walt’s daughter (Brittney Bertier) and son-in-law (Cory Washington), each of whom sit for lengthy stretches in silence. The son-in-law needs to play a extra lively function within the enterprise, whereas the daughter is cautious to maintain her distance from her father. She refuses to call considered one of her kids after him as a result of the associations for her are too painful.

Hnath is exploring the disconnect between picture and actuality. Walt’s artwork delights kids, however the artist himself casts a pall on his household. Commerce, which units up a battle for management, darkens creativity. The parable that Disney had himself frozen in order that his mind might finally be reanimated is dusted off for example these themes regardless of the legend being totally debunked. (Disney’s physique was cremated and buried at Forest Garden Memorial Park in Glendale.)

“A Public Studying” isn’t the place to be taught all about Walt Disney. Hnath is extra within the nature of biographical telling than within the story itself. Which model of a life will finally prevail? The query is inseparable from artwork.

The manufacturing, directed by Peter Richards with a dexterous hand, meticulously realizes Hnath’s unorthodox type. The language, rhythmic and purposefully repetitive, is delivered as if it have been a rating by Philip Glass.

The scenic design by David Offner establishes the company setting. Nick Santiago’s projections present a discreet background of caprice. The combination of banality and magic is on the cash.

The actors keep the premise that we’re watching a studying of a screenplay. Scripts are held as strains are volleyed. Realism isn’t the purpose, however actuality nonetheless breaks via.

Ashworth, sporting Walt’s signature mustache, doesn’t visitors in impersonation. However he’s utterly conniving within the play’s title function. He storms, he belittles, he schemes. Inevitably, he discovers he’s human. The efficiency is note-perfect.

Piper’s Roy, eloquent when silent, registers the impact of being the subordinate brother who’s accountable to the skin world. Because the daughter, Bertier conveys harm with a straight face. Washington’s Ron adopts an agreeable masks whereas advancing his personal agenda.

As unusual as it’s intriguing, “A Public Studying” asks theatergoers to hear otherwise. “A Public Studying” affords the sound of a bracingly unique dramatist discovering his personal inimitable voice.