Theater Online - New York Theater Reviews

Ayn Rand, famous for her theoretical novels and the unapologetic individualists that she inspired, is not known for her work as a dramatist. After witnessing Fresh Ground Pepper’s production of Rand’s 1934 play Ideal, it is clear why. The objective epistemologist pursues ideas at the expense of her characters, pushing them through implausible situations and strained conversations with a heavy hand, only to arrive at forced contrivances on nothing less but the purpose of life.

Rand wrote the play while she was a struggling screenwriter and much of its style seems borrowed from the cinema— audaciously sprawling changes of location, a cavalcade of different characters, a plot twist in the final scene— most of which fails to work effectively in a black box at 59E59 Theaters. The play’s story centers on a famous movie star wanted for murder. She seeks aid from six devotees, the exact number of fan mail letters her secretary just happens to notice missing from her desk at the top of the play.  Somehow Rand succeeds in constructing a crime mystery completely devoid of mystery or suspense. The plot slogs along with painful inevitability as we wait dutifully for the movie star to visit all six male fans, each representing another sect of society. There is an artist, a preacher, a family man, an intellectual, a lost soul, and an aristocrat. These characters serve as nothing more than a mouthpiece for the playwright to espouse her theory on striving for the best.

The cast does little to flesh out the two-dimensionality of the text. The actors deliver broad imitations of Hollywood clichés without the polish or flair of their celluloid predecessors. Under the direction of Jenny Beth Snyder, the play fails to find its rhythm, as performers scream and shriek at one another as if to compensate for a lack of mounting tension by manufacturing emotional intensity. The philosophical meaning of the text and the production seem to be at odds. While Rand champions an unfeeling dedication to “the highest,” the production revels in the sloppy indulgence of so much common sentiment. When the play reaches its climax, it becomes clear why Rand ultimately abandoned the dramatic form. She detests the very thing it is built to explore—frail, imperfect humanity.