A Fantastic Journey of Absurdity and Folly Replace Reality
“Fasten your seatbelts, it’s gonna be a bumpy night!” Bette Davis’s iconic quip sums up”The Skin of Our Teeth”, a limited run Broadway revival now playing at Lincoln Center’s Vivian Beaumont Theatre. This show seems to offer something for everyone, but falls short, in my humble opinion, for many reasons — there’s just too much of everything. Dinosaurs; a slew of historical figures including Moses and the Ten Commandments; and an Ice Age meltdown that morphs into Atlantic City’s boardwalk replete with carnival rides and a pageant of LGBTQ revelers. Then, a life-threatening storm washes everything away. That’s just the end of Act 1.”
The Skin of Our Teeth” garnered playwright/novelist Thornton Wilder his third Pulitzer Prize. Wilder was a big fan of theatre as an escape into comedic chaos and burlesque. He preferred the fantastic to the realistic. He’s quoted as saying,
If you want realism, go to the movies.
Chaos doesn’t usually conjure theatrical success or even be a suggested How to in reaping one of literature’s highest accolades. But in 1942, the world was at war. The United States had just entered the conflict the previous year. Fear was real if not rampant after Pearl Harbor. Broadway musicals were the people’s choice for entertainment since comedic and romantic stories lent only a temporary reprieve from the grave circumstances of every day life.
“The Skin of Our Teeth”offered, at the very least a distraction for many, a tale of levity and hope rife with Biblical and classical innuendoes. Its title is lifted from the King James Bible Job 19:20:
… I am escaped with the skin of my teeth.
It promises a close but sure getaway.
The story chronicles thousands of years of the Antrobus family. “Antrobus” is derived from the Greek word anthropos, meaning human. So this is the story of humankind. A projected newsreel on a scrim warns running in the background, warns that an Ice Age meltdown is imminent, then lauds George Antrobus (a resilient James Vincent Meredith) for inventing the wheel and the lever, before introducing his socialite wife Maggie (the always impeccable Roslyn Ruff), their son Henry (a versatile Julian Robertson), daughter Gladys (an adorable Paige Gilbert), and their maid Sabina (brilliantly portrayed by Gabby Beans).
The scrim rises and reveals a modest suburban New Jersey living room circa 1940s with Sabina nimbly flitting about as she dusts and emotes about Mr. Antrobus’s absence. After saying,
Don’t forget that a few years ago we came through the Depression by the skin of our teeth.
Sabina pauses, looks to the wings, and repeats the line loudly to alert the actor of his missed cue. When the errant actor does not appear, she breaks the fourth wall to address the audience,
I hate this play. I hate every word, but I need this job.
This laugh line, used many times throughout the play, informs us that this is a farcical play within a play.
5,000 years later. The Antrobus family is in Atlantic City — an LGBTQ parade complete with garishly dressed participants strutting and dancing about — up and down the boardwalk; Gladys and Henry are now teenagers and tempted by all the pomp and splendor; George Antrobus is being acclaimed for having invented the alphabet when a warning announces that the end of the world is near.
An apocalyptic storm picks up and like Noah, they narrowly escape in a boat.
The play follows the endless cycle of mankind’s wondrous inventions that lead to near total annihilation, then re-building and re-creating again and again. Sabina explains,
The end of this play isn’t written yet.
That’s a message of hope that reassured theatre-goers, in the 1940’s war-torn world, that life would continue and be even better than before. And it is an encouraging message today with the ongoing conflicts in the Middle East, Israeli attacking Palestinians, and the Russian attack of Ukraine.
Of the 28 actors in the cast, 19 are making their Broadway debuts, as is their audaciously devilish director Lileana Blain-Cruz (Lincoln Center Emerging Artist Award, OBIE winner for Mary Seacole). In fact, she is nominated for Tony Award for her work. There are too many performers to highlight individually, but together they were more than a well-oiled machine. They were a ensemble that kept the chaos flowing in perfect sync.
“The Skin of Our Teeth” is a wild riotous ride that marries impossible eras, like mixing The Flintstones with Leave It To Beaver and The Jefferson’s. It’s a fantastic journey of exaggerated, non-stop, absurdities.
If you want realism, go to the movies!