Not So Musical Monday: Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus

Spoiler warning: The following contains mild spoilers for Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus, which is currently running on Broadway.

William Shakespeare’s first drama, Titus Andronicus, is a play that ends with almost all of the characters being killed in horrific ways and a figurative pile of dead bodies. Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus tells the story of the people who have to clean up after the massacre, and it opens with a literal pile of dead bodies. Gary is an absurd, over the top comedy that deals with an absolutely terrible and macabre situation in a simultaneously irreverent and intelligent way, but it also occasionally tries to get too clever and distracts from its own heights.

There are only three actors in Gary—two of which have been nominated for Tony Awards for Best Featured Actress in a Play, Kristine Nielsen and Julie White. The only actor who didn’t receive a Tony nomination is Nathan Lane. That’s three-time Tony Award winner and six-time Drama Desk winner Nathan Lane. The cast is the best part of Gary as all of the performances are intense, comedic, and committed to every line. It is an example of a play where it feels the parts fit the actors perfectly. Similarly, the scale of the dead bodies and cartoonish corpses lining the stage feel absolutely perfect for helping turn such a horrible scene into something actually quite funny. It is excellent scenic work that fits the mood of the play wonderfully.  

The actors are given a lot to work with by Taylor Mac. The playwright is many things—the recipient of the MacArthur Genius Grant, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, a recipient of the Guggenheim Award, just to name a few. Gary shows the playwright’s breadth of writing talent as it is a play that is equally comfortable delving into fast paced back-and-forth dialogue as well as jokes about both flatulence and penises. That isn’t an exaggeration. This show has both an emotional speech about the temporary nature of life as well as a joke about releasing the gases from dead bodies and a joke about adjusting the penises of the dead. They work equally well in their own bizarre way.

For all the play has going right for it, which is a lot, there were two main things that kept me from loving it. Breaking the fourth wall is a technique that I feel should be dealt with very carefully. It removes a lot from the experience of a play if it isn’t done well, and unfortunately, I really didn’t like the frequent use of fourth wall breaks throughout Gary. The characters speak directly to it towards the end of show and explain a reason for it, but it still felt thoroughly distracting and took away from so many amazing jokes and moments. In a similar vein, there were several jokes that felt outside of the overall level of absurdity and comedy. For example, at one point one character jokes that “shopping is activism” and nods to the audience. It is a joke that feels like it is designed for people to whoop and snap rather than earn genuine laughs. The best comedy is comedy that treats the audience as if they’re intelligent. Most of the humor in this show did so—jokes like these disappointingly fell below that target.

I’m glad something big and absurd exists on Broadway. It’s different, and it’s refreshing to see something different on the stage. If they removed the breaking of the fourth wall and jokes that were frustratingly distracting from some great comedy, then it would be the perfect blend of intelligence and absurdity. As is, it’s still a good show that keeps getting in its own way.