From before the lights even go up, Sears naturally sinks into the role, moving and acting like a loser, but one who is nonetheless exceedingly likable. Yet Andy, who is incapable of taking leadership of any project, is not perfect himself, in the same way that Mark, acted by the playwright Sproul, is still a redeemable character despite his general dickishness.
If Mark and Andy are unaware of their surroundings, the play’s creators, including director Lindsey Moore, are finely in tune with their own. Towards the end of the play, Mark and Andy rent out a tiny theatrical space—a space not unlike the diminutive UNDER St. Marks Theater. We are treated to a play within a play that is painfully bad but hilariously appropriate, even if the stupidity is overplayed a little bit. Moore and Sproul have deftly used the minute scale of the production to suit their purposes. This kind of theatrical thrift puts to shame the ineffective extravagances of most higher budget shows.
The Artistical Process of Mark and Andy is by no means a perfect play: the tone of the dialogue struggles with consistency, and the low-budget production often commits the kind of gaffes that the play itself seeks to mock. But the real success lies precisely in Mark and Andy's modesty. That a play this minor could succeed so greatly even in New York is a reason for hope for American theater.
Mark and Andy comes at the same time as [title of show], a play that has self-consciously made it to Broadway through sheer willpower. That play, however, has used the same motivation to simply make it at all. No Tea Productions has taken what’s been given to them and, through seemingly nothing but sheer ingenuity and enthusiasm, created a work of theater that surpasses its space and all that could be expected from it. Anton Ego was right that not everyone can be a great artist. He was also right that a great artist could come from anywhere.
Through August 9 at the UNDER St. Marks Theater. The Aristical Process of Mark and Andy was written by Jeff Sproul and directed by Lindsey Moore. It stars Sproul (Mark), Matt Sears (Andy), Sabrina Farhi (Janine), Jeremy Mather (Collin), Timothy Maher (Brett), Dana Rossi (Rachel), Alicia Barnatchez (Amber), and D. Robert Wolcheck (Jay). Tickets can be purchased online at SmartTix.
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