Susan Granger’s review of “Bronx Bombers” (Circle in the Square Theater 2013-2014 season)
Eric Simonson had a clever idea: stage an inspirational, sports-themed human interest story to bring the jocks, an underserved audience, into mainstream theater. First he did “Lombardi” about the Green Bay Packers and leadership, then “Magic/Bird,” focusing on baseball and competition. Now he’s come up with the concept of what makes a great baseball team, focusing on the New York Yankees, an organization with 27 championships, more than anyone else, to its credit.
The play begins in a Boston hotel suite during the summer of 1977, when scrappy, hot-tempered Billy Martin (Keith Nobbs), the Yankees manager, benched his star right fielder, Reggie Jackson (Francois Battiste), accusing him of loafing in the outfield, igniting a famous Fenway Park dugout fallout when they lost to the Boston Red Sox. Catcher-turned-coach Yogi Berra (Peter Scolari) and team captain Thurman Munson (Bill Dawes) try to make peace in the name of sportsmanship. Tension takes the form of the tradition of teamwork versus personal stardom, as narcissistic Jackson declares, “I didn’t come here to melt into someone else’s idea of a team.”
Then, in the second act, Yogi Berra, fearing repercussions from Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, drifts off into a fantasy in which he and his wife Carmen (Tracy Shayne) host a dinner for Yankee greats, past and present, including Joe DiMaggio (Chris Henry Coffey), Lou Gehrig (John Wernke), Elston Howard (Francois Battiste), Derek Jeter (Christopher Jackson), Mickey Mantle (Bill Dawes) and Babe Ruth (C.J. Wilson), who muses, “The times, they do change you know – and, then again, they don’t.”
While writer/director Eric Simonsen toys with a provocative premise, it never fulfills its pinstriped promise, quickly becoming as sugary as a a box of Cracker Jacks, although the actors’ impersonations seem to work quite convincingly.
FYI: according to reports, when actor Peter Scolari (Lena Dunham’s dad on TV’s “Girls”) and his real-life spouse Tracy Shayne had dinner with the real-life Yogi Berra and his wife, the four immediately hit it off, perhaps igniting a friendship that may last longer than the run of the play.