By David Gordon, News Editor
The biggest stars currently on Broadway are not American.
True, on the one hand, you have Bill Pullman and Julia Stiles in "Oleanna," and the terrific foursome of "God of Carnage," Hope Davis, Jeff Daniels, James Gandolfini and Marcia Gay Harden. But on the other, you have the British crowd: Jude Law, Sienna Miller and Daniel Craig (with Hugh Jackman, an Aussie, thrown in for good measure).
On 42nd Street, Miller stars in "After Miss Julie," Patrick Marber's adaptation of August Strindberg's play. A few blocks away in back-to-back theaters, Law is playing "Hamlet," and Craig and Jackman are headlining "A Steady Rain," a cop drama.
The Michael Grandage-directed "Hamlet," a transfer of London's Donmar Warehouse's successful production, is a swift, accessible three hours and twenty minutes. Law is a violently temperamental Hamlet, not crazy, but a petulant teenager. He wildly gesticulates his way through the role and commands the stage as he delivers the famous soliloquies, which do indeed flow trippingly off the tongue.
His costars, Geraldine James as Gertrude, Kevin R. McNally as Claudius, Gugu Mpatha-Raw as Ophelia, among others, have been directed to back him up, and, in effect, don't make much of an impact. Grandage, set designer Christopher Oram and lighting designer Neil Austin have created a variety of pretty stage pictures, the most notable of which, the famous "To be or not to be," soliloquy, is set during a passing snowfall.
There's only the mention of precipitation in "A Steady Rain," Keith Huff's two-hander about a pair of cops dealing with life, sex, alcohol, racism, drive-by shootings, stabbings and cannibalism on the mean streets of Chicago. In essence, it manages to cram an entire season of "Law and Order" into ninety minutes. And who better to star as the distinctly American officers than the English Daniel Craig and the Australian Hugh Jackman? Mustachioed Craig, the stronger of the two, completely loses himself in Joey, the brains of the pair; Jackman a showman of the highest caliber, doesn't always manage to create a convincing character as Denny, the brawn.
But it is a treat, and a captivating pleasure, to watch the two of them duke it out using only their words (the play consists of dueling monologues with minimal interaction between the two). The story is a fascinating one, not entirely believable, but it is certainly engrossing, especially if you enjoy police dramas. Director John Crowley makes sure nothing gets in their way of the show's selling points (the actors, of course). His direction is quiet and restrained.
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