ANDREA PHOX
Rudy Galvan and Jordan Baker co-star in “Comfort,” which is at New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch through May 11.
Iris Banks is a famous writer, with three Pulitzer Prizes on her resume, and a possible Nobel Prize in her future. But she isn’t very creative when it comes to invective. This character calls her son Cal “you little shit” at least twice in Neil LaBute’s 2021 play “Comfort,” which is currently being produced at New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch, with direction by Evan Bergman. She also calls him “nosy little shit,” “you ungrateful little piece of shit,” “stupid little shit,” “fucking little prick,” “the worst” and (sarcastically) “such a delicate flower.”
The play’s Long Branch run happens to end on Mother’s Day. I imagine Iris would have a nasty little chuckle over that.
LaBute has a reputation for creating cruel, callous characters, and certainly, the ironically titled “Comfort” does nothing to contradict that. It is made up of conversations — over two days, in Iris’ home — between her and Cal, with whom she has had little to do with since her marriage to Cal’s father ended, years ago. The play gets tiresome at times, as Cal airs his same old grievances, and Iris offers up her same old justifications, ad infinitum. But there is some tension here — a game of cat and mouse that comes into sharper focus as the play proceeds — and LaBute, to his credit, uses this tawdry tale of a mother and son at war with each other to explore some big questions about art, and ambition, and family.
As opposed to his world-renowned mother, the 30-something Cal has not accomplished much. He tries to defend himself by saying, “Some people take a while to get their lives going.” Iris responds: “Yeah? Some people are lazy. Some people are unfocused.”
ANDREA PHOX
Rudy Galvin and Jordan Baker in “Comfort.”
He has occasionally received financial support from Iris. Which she likes to needle him about. Anything resembling normal maternal love seems beyond her. Yet there he is, visiting the home where she lives by herself. It is about a year after his father (her ex-husband) died. He could have just called to arrange a visit, but he decided to break in — that’s how the play starts, actually.
What is he doing there? It’s a mystery at first, but we learn more and more about the purpose of his visit as the play goes on, as well as the whole family history. She felt she had to choose between family and career, and went with career without batting an eyelash. Cal’s father, a teacher, was a writer, too, but never finished a book. Or, to use Iris’ sneering assessment, “He was unpublished. He was nothing. And so is his work.”
Similarly, when Cal tells her wants wants to “try out a little bit of writing myself,” she practically explodes.
“It’s not how you do it,” she says. “It doesn’t work like that — writing. You don’t ‘try it out.’ You don’t dabble. That’s shit, and that’s how you end up creating shit.”
Iris frequently justifies her cruelness by saying she’s just being honest. Interestingly, Cal says the same thing when he is being most hurtful. Another good sub-theme has to do with Iris’ argument that bad behavior by brilliant male artists is often accepted by those around them, and society at large, while brilliant female artists don’t get the same latitude. She is right, of course. But the argument seems kind of beside the point when she is making it to the son she hurt so badly.
Not surprisingly, it turns out that Cal has a plot that may help him exact some revenge. Will he pull it off? Or will the two be able to broker some kind of peace? A happy ending seems out of the question. But maybe they could at least de-escalate the hostilities.
ANDREA PHOX
Jordan Baker and Rudy Galvan in “Comfort.”
Iris is the meatier of the two roles here, and Baker does a great job at pulling off her complexities. Even in casual conversation with her only son, she conveys the imperiousness with which she has come to carry herself, now that she has become such a success. But there are moments when we are able to catch glimpses of the underlying insecurity, and genuine human emotion, that she has become accustomed to hiding.
Cal seems, in contrast (and by design), tiny: weak, unsure of himself, wishing for some kind of reconciliation or, in lieu of that, a way to strike back. We are given few details of his life beyond his relationship with his parents; more may have helped make him seem more real.
Fittingly for a play about a writer, LaBute fills it with references and allusions to Shakespeare, Hemingway and Emerson. Also A.S. Byatt, whose wry line about writers in general, “to a dusty shelf we aspire,” Cal quotes.
Not surprisingly, this bothers Iris, who is in no mood to have her grandiosity deflated. But Cal persists. “In the end,” he says, “it just doesn’t matter all that much. It’s just a few inches of shelf space in a library in somebody’s den. …”
“I don’t believe that,” Iris responds.
New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch will present “Comfort” through May 11. Visit njrep.org.
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