‘Secret Rapture’ Too Good a Secret

Can a play be too intelligent for Broadway? The question comes up in regard to the closing of David Hare’s “The Secret Rapture” at the Barrymore.

“The Secret Rapture” had a run in London and probably would have lasted at the New York Public Theatre, had Joe Papp decided to keep it there. But he tried for the golden ring, and the reviews weren’t rapturous enough to win a crowd.

Hare’s play concerns two sisters, one on the rise in the Thatcher government and the other tending to her own small design business. The first sister, according to the Village Voice’s James Leverett, is a monster. The second is a martyr. The second succumbs to the first, and finds a strange “secret rapture” in her defeat.

Leverett saw it as a modern mystery play, dark and complicated, but blazing with insights about the increasingly heartless way that nice people in Britain and America are treating each other these days: a play to be seen and pondered.

Variety agreed. Hare’s script had substance, as did Blair Brown’s portrayal of the victimized sister. But Hare’s staging “reinforces the legit adage that authors shouldn’t stage their own work.” And, after all, the topic was a bit remote for a Broadway audience.

Frank Rich of the New York Times praised the play, but hated the production, and “Secret Rapture” closed last weekend. Meanwhile, “Gilligan’s Island” and “The Love Boat” are both reportedly being considered for Broadway musicals.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK. From Variety’s report on the annual convention of the League of American Theaters and Producers, Broadway’s trade association:

“Following an explanation of how the beef industry combatted a seriously negative-image problem (mainly by spending $25 million to $30 million annually on national TV advertising) . . . resolution was passed that the League should appoint a committee to investigate generic theater advertising and how to finance it.”