Smith’s ‘House Arrest’ Gets Mixed Verdicts From Critics

“House Arrest: First Edition,” Anna Deavere Smith’s new play about the presidency, the press and the public, opened at the Kreeger Theater of Washington’s Arena Stage Wednesday, and was greeted by reviews that noted the show’s status as a work-in-progress and varied in tone.

The Washington Post’s Lloyd Rose was less encouraging (“overlong, inchoate, unfocused, dull”) than the Washington Times’ Nelson Pressley (“fascinating, if disjointed”).

Rose wrote that the most successful of several narrative strands in “House Arrest” was the one that most closely adheres to the docudramatic style of Smith’s recent works, notably “Twilight: Los Angeles: 1992,” in which Smith assembles dramatic vignettes based on interviews she has conducted with real people.

“House Arrest” also features a fictitious narrative about a theater company that’s attempting to mount a play about American history. Rose thought this part of the play was “dismal.”

J. Wynn Rousuck of the Baltimore Sun agreed that the production is “two plays fused uncomfortably into one” and found the adventures of the fictitious theater company “extraneous and distracting,” while the parts based on the interviews were “fascinating and informative.”

Pressley wrote that the play’s climax “comes from a woman who describes the slow beating death of her 5-year-old daughter,” but this “seems to come from a planet other than the one that is home to such mischievous shtick as George Stephanopoulos whirling on a revolving stage as he confides some of the secrets of political spin.”

The show is changing almost nightly, but among the surprising features in this week’s performances was the appearance of Smith herself as Bill Clinton. An Arena representative said she didn’t know if Smith would continue to play the president.

The bulk of the play is enacted by 14 actors--a “crackerjack cast,” said Rose--including several faces familiar to L.A. theatergoers--Alec Mapa, Gail Grate, Deirdre O’Connell and John Ortiz. One of the actors, Karen Kandel, left the cast after Thursday’s performances to begin rehearsals for her starring role in “Peter and Wendy,” opening next month at the Geffen Playhouse in L.A.

The second edition of “House Arrest” is scheduled to run at the Mark Taper Forum, April 16-May 31.