STAGE REVIEW : Lanford Wilson’s ‘Curtain’ Comes Up Short at Old Globe

The launching of a new Lanford Wilson play is always cause for rejoicing, but his “Redwood Curtain,” which opened Thursday at the Old Globe Theatre here, is decidedly minor Wilson.

As it stands, this “Curtain” is an extended one-act with a certain clever level of banter and a lot of intent but not enough substance derived from its central idea to sustain a two-hour conversation.

It quickly runs out of steam.

The premise has potential: Geri (Sung Yun Cho), a bright Vietnamese-American teen-ager and musical prodigy adopted by a white American family, becomes obsessed with the idea of trying to find her real father.

While on an annual visit to her aunt Geneva (Debra Monk) in Northern California, Geri tracks one of the many broken Viet vets in the region who have withdrawn from society and chosen to hide like hermits behind the curtain of the redwood forest.

The man Geri follows into the woods is a big bear of a guy (Jeff Daniels), suspicious, inarticulate, anti-social. He has a dog named Bitch and big problems meeting people. But Geri doesn’t give up, and some of the things she says to him eventually provoke responses.

What they are won’t be revealed here, but they are less than one might expect. The play ends on a mildly hopeful and not altogether true note. For all of the endless conversation, few things are clarified and nothing resolved.

Wilson is good at one-on-one exchanges and makes Geneva a sufficiently funny lady to sustain the welcome humor. On the other hand, the wryness of her patter tends to ensure that important issues will be only superficially addressed. The play is too long for what it has to tell and its discourse, which at any given time is restricted to two people, guarantees a tiresome sameness to the rhythm.

Wilson’s longtime director Marshall W. Mason has not found a way to enliven the talky expanse with watchable action, any more than Wilson has met the challenge of dealing with the issues he raises--including the alluring suggestion that Geri is possessed of some sort of preternatural powers.

Clearly, the ambition was for a probing, partly magical piece, but the thin one he’s written leaves things pretty much undisturbed. There is not enough meat on these bones to feed a hungry mind.

You can’t blame the actors for not trying. Daniels, a big man who has mastered the hunted-animal look and savage-beast wariness of the blustery vet, is particularly shattering when he crumbles in a forced admission of his pain and fears. Monk’s Geneva, graced with a battery of amusing lines, is as dry as a martini and as warm as a teddy bear. Every family should have an aunt like this one: loving but firm, fun and never cloying.

Geri, the pivotal character here, is also the sketchiest. Wilson has connected the dots in her case, but has yet to fill in the color. He seems stumped by this kid, and it is to Cho’s credit that she rolls quite ably with those punches.

Her Geri is a vivid, no-nonsense girl, intelligent and determined, but also not especially exalted, which, for all of its aspirations to myth, goes double for the play.

The classiest aspects of the production are the production values--a stunning redwood forest set by John Lee Beatty that opens up on the Globe’s revolving stage to create the high-ceilinged living room of Geneva’s house. Dazzling stuff, nicely enhanced by Dennis Parichy’s filtered light--and the only real magic around.

* “Redwood Curtain,” Old Globe Theatre, Simon Edison Centre for the Performing Arts, Balboa Park, San Diego. Tuesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7 p.m.; Saturdays-Sundays, 2 p.m. Ends Feb. 28. $21-$32; (619) 239-2255. Running time: 2 hours. Jeff Daniels: Lyman

Sung Yun Cho: Geri

Debra Monk: Geneva

Director Marshall W. Mason. Playwright Lanford Wilson. Sets John Lee Beatty. Lights Dennis Parichy. Costumes Laura Crow. Sound Chuck London, Stewart Werner. Composer Peter Kater. Fight choreographer Nels Hennum. Production stage manager Fred Reinglas. Stage manager Peter Van Dyke.