‘Methuselah’ tries to make something out of nothing

The first minutes of Cockroach Theatre's "The Methuselah Tree," by Jayme McGhan, fool you into thinking it's about something.

We're in the basement laboratory of a middle-aged man. We know he's middle-aged, because the young actor, William Adamson, has gray coloring streaked throughout his hair.

We find out he's a metaphysical scientist obsessed with his work. Wife Murielle (Dana Martin) wants more attention and talks a lot about the once-beautiful sensation of being touched. Son Jeremy (the angelic-looking Thomas Sawicki) does weird things like decapitating hamsters and setting their corpses on popsicle sticks. ("Boys will be boys," says Daddy.) Then there's that man in the attic (seen only in silhouette) who keeps saying to Jeremy (through a hole in the ceiling), "Receive me, I am the light."

This is the stuff of which fascinating absurdist drama is made.

But McGhan has much less on his mind than it first appears. The meanings of all these arty symbols becomes apparent very early in the 54-minute evening, and you keep hoping that something more complex is about to happen.

Director Sarah Norris is not a good match for McGhan's hocus-pocus. She treats his simple plot and pretentious dialogue as if it were vintage Edward Albee. She encourages the actors to pump up the laughs and interpret, rather than become, their characters. Norris might have been able to bring this script to life if she hadn't worked so hard to make things funny.

Adamson is too cerebral, too sane, to convince us that he's an eccentric scientist on a mission. Martin stands outside her role, commenting on it. Sawicki gets off to a bumpy start when he makes an entrance that seems determined to force yucks, but manages several moments of beautifully felt honesty.

Scott Fadale's set does a fine job of suggesting the lunacy of this basement of horrors, but the uncredited lights are torture if you sit in the wrong seats. Glares from unmerciful gels blind the eye and frequently leave the actors in shadow.

The real problem, though, is that the playwright seems fascinated with a form of drama that his material doesn't justify. His dialogue promises surprise wrapped in a profound message, but the audience is always a step ahead of the author. And that's two steps too many.

Anthony Del Valle can be reached at DelValle@aol.com. You can write him c/o Las Vegas Review-Journal, P.O. Box 70, Las Vegas, NV 89125.