In 1991, I saw the original Broadway production of Six Degrees of Separation with Stockard Channing and Courtney Vance. At the time, it felt like a very important cultural moment play. The acting was superb and the concept that we are all connected to everyone in the world through a chain of not more than six people became part of our vernacular. How would the play hold up? Do I need to revisit it? I let the reviews sway me and I caught Six Degrees this week on the day it posted an early closing notice. Too bad. The play holds up extremely well; I had feared it might have dated itself by this point.
The play is based on a real life story of a con man and robber who claimed to be Sidney Poitier’s son. The playwright, John Guare, had a friend who told him the personal encounter that later became the basis for this play. Set in New York in the 1990, the privileged class is in full exposure. The plot is quickly set in motion when a Harvard college friend of Ouisa and Flan’s children (Allison Janney and John Benjamin Hickey) drops by their apartment with minor stab wounds from an attempted mugging. Paul (Corey Hawkins) happens to be in town because his father is producing a film version of Cats. I had forgotten how much abuse is heaped on Cats in this play – and the fact that is again running on Broadway at the same time is perfect.
I enjoyed all of the leading performers and also the over-the-top spoiled brattiness of their children. It should be mentioned that there are 18 characters in this play, adding depth and helping to define the world surrounding Ouisa, Flan and Paul. A couple of choices made, such as the elongated nude scene, were not necessarily for the better. However, the play is rich and complex. We get further and further inside Ouisa’s mind as she comes to term with the events that have shaken their Kandinsky world. I thoroughly enjoyed this revisit to a classic.