The first half of "Breakfast at Tiffany's" (Haymarket, 27 July)

(Update: my homeboy Michael Billington was, I assume, tripping balls on press night.)

This is probably the first time I've walked out at the theater. So, in the interests of objectivity: this is a review of the first half of "Breakfast at Tiffany's." For all I know the second half would have made me rethink everything I know about performance and being human. But know that I once sat through the entirety of "Lord of the Dance: Dangerous Games."

But, my god, that first half. This version of the story, based on Truman Capote's original story rather than the deathless hot mess of a film, establishes itself as something like a dream play: the narrator reminisces about Holly Golightly, a woman of elegance and dubious morals who lived in his building in a pre-Sex and the City New York, blah blah you know the deal. But at the center of this dream is Pixie Lott, who bravely decides to play the part as a human Fleshlight who can't sing. Lott does everything in her power to strip any doubleness out of the script's many entendres; I fear she may have been trying for Marilyn, but came out closer to Gina Gershon in "Bride of Chucky," less any self-awareness or humor or fun. At one point in the production a trained cat is brought on to walk across the stage; in comparison you really appreciate the cat's calm professionalism. The story's setup also lets Holly sing a few songs--it's a £65 seat, I guess--and there, too, Pixie faltered: I lost my ability to follow the lyrics of one countryfied song, for example, as the cumulative effect of singing, maintaining an accent, and standing upright pretty much defeated her. And the ENTIRE POINT OF THE PLAY is that thingummy, the male lead, is reminiscing about this magical creature he doesn't entirely understand. Pixie's Golightly is about as mysterious as stud farming, and nearly as melodic.

It's not that anyone else is any good, either--but how can you blame actors acting opposite a central garbage fire of a part? Pixie's friend from Arkansas--no force on earth could make me look up her name from a website--had if anything a less recognizably human accent; for whole stretches I gave up trying to figure out what they were saying, and as a functionally monolingual English speaker listening to dialogue in English that's a bit of a thing. 

There were other smaller garbage fires almost obscured by the central one. The production subtly tells us the Captoe-surrogate is gay by, at one point, putting a sailor onstage behind him; as though uncertain that this would be missed, that sailor spends some time with another male sailor friend. An older man has already told Capote to join him in the restroom. It's all just this side of a sandwich-board saying I ENJOY SEXUAL INTERCOURSE WITH MEN. Next to the lead performance, this seemed like Ibsen. 

(The Japanese photographer, for devotees of the film, spoke English with no accent whatsoever.)

I fear I'm making this all sound more interesting than it was. Like the cat, though, the performances were all coached to within an inch of their lives; what energy there was seemed to be from the people in front of me, who were (justifiably) angry at how awful this was.