A few years before R. Crumb's siblings and the Lidz uncles, the Collyer Brothers, real-life "Hermits of Harlem," slowly declined from high society into ostracized seclusion. They were ultimately found, long-dead, by police who discovered the two bodies walled in by eccentric inventions and bundles of newspapers. Richard Greenberg, who is becoming a formidable dramatist, didn't let himself be bound by the truth when turning the Collyer story into The Dazzle, which gives one brother some traits of the other and disregards chunks of real biography. But theater is not journalism, and what counts is the dysfunctional-yet-loving dynamic set up between Homer and Langley. Early on, we think we'll tire of Homer's catty comments and, especially, of his esthete brother's neuroses as they natter on at each other. Yet into that situation comes a pretty wildcard (Francie Swift), a love interest of sorts, who brings life to the loners (and whose strange behavior is explained rather suddenly in act two). What raises The Dazzle to the level of art (aside from the quarantined world of bric-a-brac created by the production's fine designers) are the many symbolic touches woven throughout the piece and how touching the brothers' dance of "diminishment" ultimately becomes.
