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LINDA LAVIN surprised the New York theater world last summer when she passed up roles in not one but two hotly anticipated Broadway shows in favor of an Off Broadway play called "The Lyons." It was hard to see what was so special about the project: Ms. Lavin's character was the matriarch of yet another dysfunctional family; the play's author, Nicky Silver, had an uneven track record; and the production was at a 125-seat theater downtown.By PATRICK HEALY
Published: April 5, 2012
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Linda Lavin in her New York apartment. More Photos »
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Linda Lavin as Rita, the matriarch of the dysfunctional family in a 2011 production of "The Lyons," a play by Nicky Silver. More Photos »
The strangest part? At 74, Ms. Lavin was declining bigger shows so she could play Rita Lyons, a mother who challenges audience sympathies from the opening moments of Mr. Silver's play. While her husband, Ben, lies nearby in a hospital bed, writhing and cursing, Rita muses about redecorating the family living room. When Ben pleads for sympathy with the words "I'm dying, Rita," her response — "Yes, I know. Try to be positive." — tells you plenty about their marriage, the play's sharp snap and Rita's worldview.
As well as why Ms. Lavin chose the role.
"It's the absolute naked fury of the comedy that I wanted to play, to get to the pain underneath all of the bullying and denigrating things these characters say," Ms. Lavin said during an interview in her apartment on Central Park South. "And there was a challenge in it for me — to see if I could portray Rita fully enough so people could relate to her."
No question Ms. Lavin identified with Rita more than with the role she's best known for, the sunny title character of the CBS series "Alice," and more than most of the roles she's had in her five-decade career in theater, including plum parts in the musical "Follies" and the drama "Other Desert Cities," the two shows she gave up for "The Lyons."
"It's very rare that writing moves you to see the madness in yourself — to the anger in yourself — and to your capability of being able to laugh at yourself at the same time you're furious with other people, as Rita is," Ms. Lavin said, her legs pressed to her chest as she tucked herself into one end of a sofa.
"The Lyons" opened at the Vineyard Theater last October to rapture from critics, particularly for Ms. Lavin's performance, which Ben Brantley of The New York Times praised for "the surprising dimensions she finds within one-liners." When the play ended its run in November, there was strong buzz that it would transfer to Broadway, but the $2.5 million capitalization proved hard to raise, in part because ideal theaters were not available. In February, however, the transfer fell into place, when the Cort Theater became free; "The Lyons" is now in previews there, one of eight new plays opening on Broadway this month.
Ms. Lavin said choosing "The Lyons" has paid off "the way I'd hoped, because you hope to be proven right when you go with your gut on projects."
She was drawn most to Rita's desire to take charge of her life after decades spent married to the miserable Ben (Dick Latessa) — a man she admits she never loved — raising two children who have become adult basket cases (Michael Esper and Kate Jennings Grant). With Ben dying, Rita faces a new choice: Should she do what she feels is expected of a soon-to-be-widow or start living on her own terms? Ms. Lavin said she instantly understood why unpredictability would terrify Rita, and how such terror — though hidden under her elegant Bergdorf wardrobe — is the source of so much black comedy.
"Who out there, woman or man, hasn't felt that they've taken on some sort of false role in life?" she asked. "Being with someone they didn't love enough, taken a job that really didn't make them happy.
"And then when you break out of that false role, does that mean everything automatically works out? Mmmmm," added Ms. Lavin, who makes an art form out of her well-placed "mmms" and "hmms" to underscore a point.
These questions are hardly theoretical for Ms. Lavin. Growing up in Portland, Me., she recalled that she would play piano at family parties and sing on the beach for friends of her mother — an opera singer — because "I thought getting attention was the same thing as getting love." In 1970 she received the first of her five Tony nominations, for Neil Simon's "Last of the Red Hot Lovers," but then bolted, at 36, for Hollywood.
She spent a few years struggling until she landed "Alice," a sitcom that ran from 1976 to 1985 and provided financial security. Returning to New York she won a Tony in 1987 for Mr. Simon's "Broadway Bound" but quickly grew frustrated with the lack of top-tier theater gigs available. She was in the replacement casts of "Gypsy" and "The Sisters Rosensweig," and all but gave up on the idea of being a leading lady on Broadway. She also had two divorces behind her, from the actors Ron Leibman and Kip Niven.
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