Performance: Hearts of Man (The Riot Group) (Future Showtimes)

It was a Wednesday night and the crowd was thin. There were a lot of empty seats in the audience, even though there was a post-show discussion scheduled. Theatre tip: The Arcadia Stage at the Arden Theatre has poor sight lines. I was only three rows back and in the middle, and I still had to twist around in my seat to see everything that was happening on stage.

Hearts of Man
I decided to see this play not because the description sounded particularly good (it didn't) but because it had a fantastic blurb from Tony Kushner, who rules. I thought that any play Tony Kushner likes had to be good.

I was wrong.

It was okay. The acting was okay. The script was okay up until a long, overwritten dream monologue near the end, at which point it fell apart.

A guy is accused of luring kids on the internet for sex. Except that it was a trap; he was actually chatting with a middle-aged police detective. The guy's sister persuades her boss, a very Christian lawyer, to defend her brother.

Much moral posturing ensues.

Everyone gets to have deep feelings and a backstory except the central guy, who barely says a word. This is a terrible mistake, as he's the most interesting character, the one who truly has the most at stake. What does he think of what he's done? How does he feel about having propositioned what he thought was a 14-year-old boy for sex? What does he think of the fact that it was a fat, balding detective instead? Does he think he's innocent or guilty? Of what, exactly?

The play tries to engage with interesting subjects like fantasy and the internet; mobs and hysteria; thought police vs. protecting the innocent, but without a compelling emotional center it all falls flat.