Little Theatre’s ‘Jeffrey’ lacks right tone

There's an early moment in Las Vegas Little Theatre's "Jeffrey" that illustrates why the production is such a disaster.

A character we don't yet know asks our hero for his blood tests, the name of his internist, his most recent X-rays, his passport, and a list of all previous sexual contacts. When Jeffrey responds with, "Well, OK, but isn't that a little extreme?" the other guy snaps, "Do you want the apartment?"

That's one of author Paul Rudnick's funniest lines, but the joke dies in the hands of director Jay Joseph and actor John Imro for a simple reason: Imro comes across not as a concerned landlord, but as a performer setting up a bit.

The script is about a gay, New York City actor/waiter in the early 1990s who responds to the exploding AIDS crisis by disconnecting from just about everyone. Its core is somber, but it's stuffed with one-liners. Jeffrey is a modern-day Candide who, in the midst of tragedy, sets out to find meaning in life.

Joseph's version drastically and continually alternates between dumb, loud silliness, and Joan Crawford pathos.

Enoch Augustus Scott plays Jeffrey as if he were doing stand-up. Scott is many good things as a performer, but he's not a leading man. He's such a one-note flamer here that he's not able to ground the show; to be our "in" into the story. You can't figure out what his love interest (Alex Pink) sees in him. The duo's never-ending scenes lack chemistry. And Scott's weepy tirades bring to mind a neurotic drag queen who's watched too many soaps.

Curious, too, how the director has nearly all the gay male characters played extremely effeminate. Nothing wrong with effeminate men, but Joseph would have us believe they are the gay community's only surviving species.

Ginger McCann, in multiple but brief roles, nearly redeems the evening. Whether playing a gum-chewing, tight-skirted ding-dong of a talk-show sidekick or a smartly dressed, wacko post-modern evangelist, the actress establishes a strong reality base that makes believable her exaggerations in manner.

But Joseph hasn't been able to find the right tone for this campy world. So many scenes come off crass rather than light-hearted that the show may prove an insult to straights and gays alike.

Anthony Del Valle can be reached at vegastheaterchat @aol.com. You can write him c/o Las Vegas Review-Journal, P.O. Box 70, Las Vegas, NV 89125.