Stalling Out on Broadway

The question throbbing against my skull as I left the dull Broadway revival of Driving Miss Daisy was this: Can a performer give a fully realized performance in a two-dimensional role? I never really thought about it before, but Vanessa Redgrave is the kind of actress to raise such questions.

The haughty Redgrave, last seen on Broadway in The Year of Magical Thinking, would seem an unlikely fit for Alfred Uhry’s beloved, dramaturgically challenged play (Pulitzer Prize notwithstanding). But she turns the elderly, Jewish Daisy Werthan into a living, breathing woman, something that seems impossible if you simply listen to Uhry’s dialogue—particularly during director David Esbjornson’s particularly hokey production.

The genteel Daisy, you see, is a terror behind the wheel. So her well-meaning son Boolie (Boyd Gaines) hires the equally elderly, African-American Hoke (James Earl Jones) to chauffeur her. Why Boolie chose a man in his seventies is never really explained, other than that Hoke once worked for a friend of his father’s. But this is the 1940s, so Hoke and Daisy are equally outsiders in Atlanta’s Southern hierarchy; a point Esbjornson goes out of his way to hammer home. During a road trip with Daisy and Hoke, highway signs like “Jesus Saves” and “This is KKK Country” flash above the stage.

The whole play has that same well-meaning heavy-handedness, from Hoke commiserating with Daisy over the bombing of her temple by recalling lynchings, to Daisy’s ladylike insistence that she harbors no prejudice, even as she refers to “them” and accuses Hoke of stealing from her. Set in a different time, with characters just slightly younger, and the push-pull of Daisy and Hoke’s relationship would have the makings of a rom-com. But even in Uhry’s “Aren’t these battling old people cute?” script, nothing prepares us for James Earl Jones’ sloppy performance.

The famous voice is as slurry and rushed as the Mississippi, leaving most of the dialogue an unintelligible mishmash. Even worse, Jones seems to be giving a minstrel performance; my companion asked in a whisper when he would start shuckin’ and jivin’. The episodic script, which cuts to another scene just as things promise to get interesting, already feels thin and forced when spread out on a Broadway stage; Jones’ loud, obvious performance just adds another layer of “WTF?” to the proceedings.

But there’s always Redgrave, with an impeccable Southern accent, to keep the sentimental proceedings somewhat in check. Alas, even she fails us in the play’s final moments, when Daisy’s son relegates her to an old folk’s home. Then, all of Redgrave’s technique deserts her, and she turns into a cartoon of an aged woman, the Granny Clampett of Broadway, jutting out her jaw in imitation of someone missing her teeth.

There will always be those people who respond to the coarse emotional manipulation of Uhry’s script, with its built-in tear-jerking moments. But for once, knowing that they don’t write ’em like they used to is a relief.

Driving Miss Daisy

Through Jan. 29, 2011, Golden Theatre, 252 W. 45th St. (betw. 7th & 8th Aves.), 212239-6200; $66.50-$131.50