Good for Otto

I

With a Tony-awarded playwright, a stellar cast and an important topic, how could The New Group’s production of David Rabe’s play about mental health care in America possibly go wrong? Let me count the ways. While my “I” grade stands for “Incomplete” (since I couldn’t force myself to return after intermission), it could just as well stand for “inert” or “indulgent.” Dr. Michaels (Ed Harris), the chief therapist and administrator of a small town mental health clinic in northwest Connecticut, has a lot to deal with — the patients he cares for deeply, the insurance company bureaucracy he battles, and the verbal abuse he receives from the ghost of his mother (a miscast Charlotte Hope). who committed suicide when he was nine. His patients include Jane (Kate Buddeke), a woman guilt ridden over her son Jimmy’s suicide; Jerome (Kenny Mellman), a hoarder who can’t bring himself to move to his mother’s basement; and the patient the doctor is most concerned over, Frannie, (Rileigh McDonald), a 12-year-old girl who cuts herself and is subject to violent outbursts. We also meet another therapist, Evangeline (Amy Madigan), whose patients include Timothy (Mark Linn-Baker), a man on the spectrum whose social awkwardness gets him into trouble; Alex (Maulik Pancholy), a gay man who has recently come out (whom I unfortunately did not meet because he only appears in the second act); and Barnard (the wonderful F. Murray Abraham), an intellectual 77-year-old who could not rouse himself to get out of bed for several weeks. Laura Esterman doubles as Jerome’s mother and Barnard’s wife. Rhea Perlman portrays Nora, the foster mother struggling to cope with Frannie. Nancy Giles plays Marcy, the soulless case manager at the insurance company. Lily Gladstone is Denise, the clinic’s receptionist. One of the most powerful scenes in the first act is the extended monologue by the ghost of Jimmy (Michael Rabe, the playwright’s son) describing the night he shot himself. Although the scene does not really fit into the framework of the play since Jimmy was not a patient and his remarks are not shared with anyone except the audience, it was one of the few times that I felt involved. The stringing together of monologues and therapy sessions grew tiresome quickly. Dr. Michaels’s fantasy of all his patients joining to sing old favorites such as “Glow Worm” didn’t work for me. The set design by Derek McLane is appropriately drab. Director Scott Elliott made the interesting choice to seat several members of the audience onstage interspersed among the actors. Perhaps if I had stayed for the second act, my opinion of the play might have improved. Or not. Running time: three hours including intermission.