Review: Linda Lavin's Sublime, But Richard Greenberg's OUR MOTHER'S BRIEF AFFAIR is Hardly One To Remember

At 78 years of age, Linda Lavin shouldn't be expected to carry such bulky and cumbersome items as Richard Greenberg's OUR MOTHER'S BRIEF AFFAIR on her back eight times a week, but give the invaluable stage star a chic New York Jewish mother to play, toss her a handful of reasonably stinging passive aggressive barbs she can wryly unleash, and the consummate pro will send the patrons home with at least a few happy memories.

And memories are what Greenberg's story is all about, though not necessarily reliable ones. Lavin plays Anna, a widowed mom of twins making one of her semi-annual trips to the deathbed while between bouts with dementia.

With a kittenish glint in her eye, she asks her son Seth (Greg Keller), a celibate obituary writer, if he'd like to hear about the affair she once had. If what she says is true, then it seems that when Seth was a teenager taking violin lessons at Julliard, Anna, who accompanied him on the trips to the city from their Long Island home, would spend the time keeping company with a handsome and charming stranger (John Procaccino). She says that shortly after their first intimate rendezvous, he revealed himself to be a notorious, real-life figure from the past; a person who many of Anna's generation would unapologetically spit on.

Seth's sister Abby (Kate Arrington) flies in from California and while the two of them take turns narrating their thoughts to the audience and offering judgments, Anna and her beau play out their continued intimacies.

The playwright probably has something to say about forgiveness or the allure of bad boys, but while there's a decent amount of cleverness in his lines, the story never amounts to anything of significant consequence. Director Lynne Meadow's production is fine and neither she nor her actors should be blamed for the overall sluggishness of the overwritten proceedings, but aside from Lavin, who deftly blends from acerbic to gently sentimental, OUR MOTHER'S BRIEF AFFAIR is hardly one to remember.

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