Say Your Prayers, Mug!: Meta-Gangsters

There's a certain style to the sound and feel of an old gangster film; Todd Michael's new play Say Your Prayers, Mug! skewers all the tropes of the genre, but with a twist- we're watching the old 1935 movie on a 1954 morning talk show, "Sunrise Cinema", where our hosts Skip and Dottie interrupt our viewing with commercials for the products they endorse, rants about communism, and trivia about the actors in the "film".

The play is a hoot and a half- Mr. Michael's dialogue is witty and amusing, perfectly in tune with the tedious gangster melodrama- the work is often reminiscent of Charles Busch.

The actors are uniformly fantastic, hitting their character types dead-on, whether it's the hardboiled blonde with a heart of gold, the Irish police chief, the giggling gangster killer, or the ditzy chorus "goil".  Jill Yablon (who also co-directs) is perfect as Platinum Kane (the aforementioned Blonde) and Jimmy Blackman is a great Flatfoot as Sgt. Dan Gargan; their scenes together crackle and pop.  Walter J. Hoffman commits Grand Larceny: Show as the evil Lefty Kane.  Lawrence Lesher and Patrick McColley do double time as the gangsters and the cops.  Sarah Bunker is hilariously squeaky as Kitty De Villiers, and Ryan Stadler is a solid Sonny Rocco with his Edward G. Robinson "nyeahs". 

On the "Sunrise Cinema" side, Thom Brown III does excellently Bryllcreemed and mellifluous work as Skip Rayburn.  Playwright and co-director Michael takes on the role of Dottie- his is the only performance that could use some work- because it's so detailed.  In his overdone accoutrements, every bat of an eyelash and sudden drop to baritone hits the audience with the force of a hurricane.  He's hilarious, but sometimes at the expense of his own writing: Skip and Dottie, as the frame story, are written a little more realistically than the movie they're watching, and Michael's over-the-top performance is confusing- it makes it seem that Dottie is in on her own joke.  But still, he's very funny.

This could make an excellent Amazon Women on the Moon-style movie, if it were to be filmed.  It works fine onstage, though the constant presence of Skip and Dottie restricts the actors' movements in the small Red Room stage.

Highly enjoyable, I recommend it.

Say Your Prayers, Mug!
Presented by Horse Trade in association with Grayce Productions
Theater: The Red Room: 85 East 4th Street, 3rd floor; New York, NY 10003
Dates & Times: Thus - Sat @ 8pm THRU OCT.27 ONLY!
TICKETS $18; Seniors: $15; Students: $15
PAY WHAT YOU WILL THURSDAYS!
212-868-4444 or SmartTix.com - Running Time: 60 minutes

Photo credit: Louis Lopardi: 1. Jimmy Blackman, Walter Hoffman, Lawrence Lesher; 2. Walter Hoffman, Ryan Stadler