There’s a handsome TV-star character in Broadway’s “The Country House” who’s a bit like Goldilocks. One woman comes at him, but she’s too young. Another is too old. The third one is about his age, and just right.
The fact that nothing happens between the two is the only surprise in this pleasant but predictable Manhattan Theatre Club production.
Come to think of it, this comfort-food of a play by Donald Margulies (“Time Stands Still”) is like Goldilocks’ porridge: not too hot, not too cold — just . . . lukewarm.
The TV hunk, Michael (Daniel Sunjata), is crashing at the Berkshire house of his old friend Anna (Blythe Danner), a famous stage actress who’s summering there while appearing at the Williamstown Theatre Festival — you know Anna’s a theatah grande dame because she wears scarves in the middle of summer.
Michael is also doing a show at the fest because Williamstown is where “all ambivalent successful actors come for absolution,” another guest, Walter (David Rasche), says.
Walter himself has no problem with his status as a rich Hollywood director. He used to be married to Anna’s late daughter and has arrived with his much younger actress girlfriend, Nell (Kate Jennings Grant).
This doesn’t impress Walter’s kid, Susie (Sarah Steele), who’s come up from Yale and is the only one steering clear from the family biz. Her psychotically sanctimonious uncle, Elliot (Eric Lange), should emulate her, but no, this middle-aged loser keeps trying — he’s now failing at playwriting after years of failing at acting.
Margulies draws from Chekhov, especially “The Seagull” and “Uncle Vanya,” for his fractious weekend in the country. Spotting the parallels will keep you busy for a while, along with Danner, who’s amusing and blessedly restrained in a role that could easily have turned into a caricature. Steele, so good as Alan Cumming’s daughter on “The Good Wife,” is earthy and keen, her character a breath of fresh air in this hothouse of self-regard.
Under the direction of the prolific Daniel Sullivan, classy and subdued as usual, the show trots along at a solid clip, dotted with the expected bon mots (Elliot’s such a pain that he’s “on everyone’s life-is-tooshort list”), episodes of painful truth-telling, arguments and fights. Add a typically luxurious set by John Lee Beatty and you’ve got yourself a pleasant evening out.
And yes, that is faint praise.