A Naked Girl on the Appian Way, Richard Greenberg's play about a middle-aged couple's interaction with their three grown adopted children, is a low-level sitcom that tries hard to be funny but spends a long time bogged down in banal drivel. There are a few good jokes, but there are few ideas, little action, and mostly reminiscing for the first forty-five minutes. Richard Thomas is very busy acting, and the charming, talented Jill Clayburgh, who is capable of real humor and real drama, does her misdirected (by Doug Hughes) best to give some reality to her character. Since the director chose to play it sitcom rather than real, it gets more idiotic as it goes on. Serious issues such as a brother and sister who are not DNA-related falling in love, are diminished by attempts at humor. It all comes out boring.
Ann Guilbert, as a feisty old neighbor, steals the show with her crisp one liners, especially the crass and bitchy ones. If there is a message in the play, it is that everybody in the world is bisexual. I, myself, prefer elm trees. But I wouldn't put that on the stage.
So I walked out whistling the set (gorgeous work by John Lee Beatty). Catherine Zuber's costumes and Peter Kaczorowski's lighting are just fine. It's a pleasure to see Clayburgh on the stage - I hope she comes again in a better vehicle.
