The title character in Tracy Letts’ remarkable new play, Mary Page Marlowe, now at Off Broadway’s Second Stage Theater, calls herself “unexceptional.” And in many ways she is: a Midwestern-born hardworking mom with a few marriages (and affairs) under her belt, plugging away in the humdrum field of accounting.
Yet in reality, Mary Page Marlowe is so exceptional that it takes six actresses to portray her: Blair Brown (Mary Page at ages 59, 63 and 69), Emma Geer (age 19), Mia Sinclair Jenness (age 12), Tatiana Maslany (ages 27 and 36), Kellie Overbey (age 50), and Susan Pourfar (ages 40 and 44).
Sure, Letts—the pen behind the powerhouse Pulitzer and Tony winner August: Osage County, plus plays including Man From Nebraska, Bug, and Killer Joe—could have cast Mary Page with fewer actresses. Two or three. Or even one, for that matter. In Clare Barron’s recent Dance Nation, adults of all ages played a group of preteen and teen girls and it worked brilliantly. But there’s something powerful—and truthful—about seeing Mary Page grow and change into all of these different women before our very eyes. And for anyone who gripes that Maslany doesn’t look enough like Overbey, or that Pourfar looks nothing like Brown: What did you look like 20 or 30 years ago?
Letts gives us snapshots of Mary Page’s life over a period of 57 years—actually, her entire life if you include the scene where she’s a baby in her crib. (Fun fact: When this show premiered at Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre in 2016, the newborn Mary Page was played by three real babies. They were quickly replaced by a doll.)
When we first meet our heroine, she’s 40, on the brink of a divorce, in a nondescript restaurant in her hometown of Dayton, Ohio, and breaking the news to her quiet 12-year-old son, Louis (Ryan Foust) and smart-mouthed 15-year-old daughter, Wendy (Kayli Carter). (Wendy, on moving to Kentucky: “Mom, they’re a bunch of hicks! They’re coal miners! … I don’t want to spend my last two years in high school with a bunch of hillbillies!” Mary Page (a terrific Pourfar): “This isn’t Paris.” No one lobs a geographic insult like Letts.) Then, he flashes back to college-age Mary Page, doing a tarot-card reading in her dorm with her girlfriends. And forward to 63-year-old Mary Page (Brown, in top form), watching House, M.D., and eating garlicky spaghetti with her husband Andy (Brian Kerwin). Then back to her parents’ living room, where her parents (Grace Gummer and Nick Dillenburg) are engaging in what one suspects is a recurring whiskey-fueled row. And so on and so on.
It’s like flipping through a massive photo album of Mary Jane’s life: The images may be out of order, but the hairdos and clothing tell you right where you are. Costume designer Kaye Voyce and Anne Ford-Coates, who’s responsible for the hairstyles, deserve massive credit for giving this production such a strong visual timeline. As the 27-year-old Mary Page, Orphan Black alum Maslany (who’s dynamite, incidentally) wears a groovy polyester wrap dress that’s synonymous with the early ’70s, and a wide-collared trench coat that could have been ripped from Mary Tyler Moore’s closet. At age 36, she sports the short, no-nonsense ’do so many working women did (my mom included!) in the early ’80s. A few years later, both Pourfar and Carter have the feathered and teased hair that we all had, regrettably, in the mid-’80s. And daughter Wendy’s crimped hair and Seattle-grunge-inspired plaid outfit is so spot-on for the year 1990. As soon as a scene begins and you see Mary Page’s hair, you’ll know almost exactly how old she is.
Director Lila Neugebauer knows how to handle episodic storytelling (see: Sarah DeLappe’s The Wolves), and her work here is no exception; her subtle, purposeful transitions give Letts’ decade-jumping story precisely the connective tissue it needs. A few words about the ending: If you like your plots resolved, Mary Page Marlowe will leave you unsatisfied. You’ll probably expect Mary Page’s penultimate line to be the last. But then, there are two more lines—a quick exchange between her and her friendly dry cleaner, Ben (Elliot Villar). If Letts had stopped in the obvious place, with the snappy one-liner, that would have been too typical. You might say unexceptional. And Mary Page Marlowe is anything but unexceptional.
Mary Page Marlowe opened July 12, 2018 at the Tony Kiser Theater and runs through Aug. 19. Tickets and information: 2st.com
