While Charlie has unresolved issues touching on his lover’s religion, he doesn’t make jokes about it.
He ballooned later, in misery and heartbreak, after the death of his boyfriend – also a Mormon. She is the offspring of a time when he was a large man but not yet grotesque – a time before Charlie fully understood and embraced the fact that he was gay. In set designer Chelsea Warren’s claustrophobic living room, the cluttered roost of a suffocating man, unfolds a last gambit for redemption.Ĭharlie wants desperately to reconnect with his daughter, whom he hasn’t seen since her infancy. Thus is the table set for the extended finishing drive of a smartly crafted, articulate and affecting drama that holds one spellbound over an unbroken course of 110 minutes. The slowing beat of Charlie’s existence is disrupted by two arrivals: his daughter Ellie ( Leah Karpel), a high school senior volcanic in her anger, spiteful toward the world and closed to all caring, and a buttoned-up young man who will identify himself only as Elder Thomas, a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints - a Mormon, portrayed with zealous optimism by Will Allan. But otherwise, Charlie just keeps plugging, and inching closer to death. His refusal to take care of himself properly or go to the hospital (because he has no insurance) drives Liz nuts. Despite the increasing difficulty he has merely drawing breath, he never has a morose word for his visiting nurse Liz – the spunky, acid-tongued Cheryl Graeff. Virtually immobile, he earns a living as an Internet writing tutor, and he’s devoted to helping his young charges rise above their terse displays of ineptitude.Ĭharlie simply doesn’t complain. He is stamped with personalized definitions of suffering and loss, error and regret, loneliness and sorrow. The book of Charlie’s life is a lexicon of bad stuff. Therein lies the elegance, truth and hope of Hunter’s beautifully made play. He doesn’t want his life to end as a tragedy. There are things he wants to fix while he still can.
Now, in what should be his prime, he’s dying of congestive heart failure. Hunter’s “The Whale” at Victory Gardens: Like him, we find it hard to look into the pain-ravaged heart of his 17-year-old daughter.īeneath that morbid obesity, Charlie – Dale Calandra padded up to a nearly inert mass – is just a guy, a dad, a teacher who communicates better with his students than he ever has with his daughter. JohnsonĮvery person watching the play must feel something in common with Charlie, the 600-pound middle-aged man who occupies much of the stage and certainly the central place in Samuel D. Hunter, at Victory Gardens Theater through May 5 ★★★★ By Lawrence B.
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