Mea culpa. Mea culpa. As a reviewer I did the unthinkable and walked out after the first act of “Homebody/Kabul,” now at the Mark Taper Forum. However, it must be asserted in my favor that the first act lasted for an intolerably long hour-and- a-half and that 45 minutes were taken up by a monologue that would have been twice as long if it had been recited at normal speed.
This is supposed to be a heady play and Tony Kushner, the author, has a way with words and ideas. But what good is that if you cannot understand them? As the play opens, a woman is sitting in the middle of stage with a minimal setting of table and two chairs, obviously her living room. She then takes off into her recitation which indicates that she is (A) a ditzy homebody; (B) a brilliant purveyor of profound ideas about the world; and (C) someone who talks too fast.
“I love the world,” she tells us. Further, she is entranced with Kabul, in Afghanistan, because she has found an old guidebook. So she kindly reads to us excerpts tracing the history of the city back from 3,000 B.C. The act continues as the scene changes and we find ourselves in Kabul. Our homebody is missing and her husband and daughter are trying to find out what has happened to her. Is she dead? Is she lost? Is she sitting on a ruin reading her book? Why are they in Afghanistan in 1998 when the Taliban is in control?
The daughter goes outside wearing her berqa, but when she takes it off, an Afghani tries to beat her. Fortunately, she is saved by another man who speaks Esperanto and English and guides her through the city.
From what I saw, the acting was not particularly impressive. Linda Edmond did her best as the homebody. Reed Burney is her husband and Maggie Gyllenhaal her daughter. Frank Galati directed.
There are many deep ideas ranging around the play and these can be discovered by reading explanatory articles in the program or, possibly, by sitting through two intermissions and another two hours of political philosophy. Give me Tom Stoppard any time.