GOD’S FAVORITE run dates: 2/15/2008 - 2/17/2008 Allaert Auditorium, Galvin Fine Arts Center St. Ambrose University, Davenport ____________________________________________________________________________
Neil Simon’s GOD’S FAVORITE is the best-known of several plays based on the story of Job that is found in the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Many may recognize "the patience of Job" as a descriptive phrase, even without knowing the actual story.
For those who do know the Book of Job, you are aware than Job was anything but patient. He was faithful in suffering, yes, but he was not silent and passively accepting of the many disasters that plagued him. For the rest of you, the gist of the story involves something akin to a bet that God makes with Satan – about whether Job will renounce his faith in God if all the people and things he has been blessed with are taken away.
Struck by nearly every possible ill and stripped of everything and everyone he has ever valued, Job is encouraged by those remaining around him to curse the God who let such horrible things happen. Steadfast throughout, Job retains his faith, and everything he lost is eventually restored. In Simon’s retelling, the central character is Joe Benjamin, a successful businessman with a good-sized family and an even larger home, and he is visited by an inept messenger who passes along communications from the beyond (or wherever the bet has taken place).
In the St. Ambrose production, directed by Michael P. Kennedy, Matt Mercer stars as Joe, and Seth Kaltwasser co-stars as Sidney Lipton, the less-than-apt G-team employee who has been assigned to Joe’s project.
Mercer struggles a bit in the first act (or he did at the final dress rehearsal I saw), turning an extended passage into what feels like overt exposition. He finds his stride later in the show – perhaps being more comfortable playing a plagued protagonist than a has-it-all, uber-perfect business tycoon – and Mercer’s work as a suffering Job is very nicely done.
Kaltwasser comes across as more slacker-like than nebbishly neurotic – perhaps as a result of not having seen so many other Simon characters as to feel the need to play the type (which is not necessarily a bad thing) – and he earns laughs for his often-elastic physicality in the role.
Joe’s wife, Rose, is no more fleshed out than any other female character in a Simon play, giving Katie McCormack no chance to show whether she can act or not. As Joe’s twins, Sarah and Ben, Jenna Clark and Sean D. Tweedale are perfectly, annoyingly Simon-ized. Rick Sheehan and Jessica Stratton, who play a pair of domestic servants, struggle a bit to find a consistent tone, and their best moments come during an over-the-top prayer session that will definitely make you snicker.
Ryan Westwood is the show’s standout, playing David, the older son. His take on the disillusioned character is witty, visceral and immediate – wringing a perfectly nuanced performance out of lines that could have offered so much less.
On the technical side of things, the set and furniture (and for that matter, the costumes) used for this production do not have the polish that would be expected in the home of a millionaire. The switch from the first set to the burned-out shell of the home is pretty impressive, though, and the sound design – by Michael Kline – is really wonderful. I especially enjoyed the jazz sound track that plays through most of the intermission. Eric Behnke’s lighting design also looks good.
Not at the level audiences might expect from Kennedy and the production team, this GOD’S FAVORITE still has its moments. And while it might appeal most to those who find the underlying themes to be resonant, the play’s comic moments and moving ones – in particular the ones graced by Westwood – will please many who see this show.
