‘Mr. Shaw’ is a rich premiere

Tom Titus

All too often, world premieres of new plays aren’t quite ready for

prime time. Then there’s that rare production that hits on all

cylinders, its energetic ensemble regaling the first audiences to

view the new work -- which, happily, is the current case at the

Laguna Playhouse.

“Mr. Shaw Goes to Hollywood,” a remarkable and thoroughly

entertaining comedy by Mark Saltzman, is one of those rare birds, a

rich and robust fictionalization of an actual visit by playwright

George Bernard Shaw to the film capital in 1933, and the bumbling

attempts of the industry giants to pry away the rights to his works

for potential movie scripts.

No one still living could separate fact from fiction regarding

those events 70 years ago, but some of the highlights -- including

the planning of a chicken lunch for the militant vegetarian -- are

matters of historical record, as well as the Shaws hitching a ride to

Hollywood from a UCLA student after their plane made an emergency

landing in Malibu.

With these truths as a nucleus, Saltzman has peopled his play with

giants of the time -- Louis B. Mayer, William Randolph Hearst, Marion

Davies, John Barrymore, Clark Gable -- and turned them into a

supporting cast of targets for the subtle but scathing GBS wit.

Director Daniel Henning has chosen a superior company to bring these

legends to life.

Shaw himself is enacted as an Olympian egotist, toying with the

Tinseltown proletariat, by Nicolas Coster, thoroughly enjoying the

obsequious attention and well aware of the motives of these greedy

cinema merchants. Coster’s regal bearing and bemused observations are

striking contrasts to the more visceral actions of the natives -- and

his puzzlement over a Variety headline (Fay Wray Pay Day), after the

blockbuster “King Kong” opens, is a particular kick.

Mala Powers excels as the great man’s wife, Charlotte, affecting a

credible Irish accent and serving as Shaw’s link to the common

people. Powers’ gentle civility offsets her husband’s lordliness, a

quality she maintains until learning of the meat on the luncheon menu

-- at which point she becomes even more strident than her husband.

The Hollywood “names” are uniformly excellent, but the standout of

that field is Carmen Thomas as former chorine Marion Davies, who’s

hitched the wagon of her career to the star of mega media publisher

Hearst. In Thomas’ hands, crassness becomes an art form, and her

brassy, seductive mannerisms propel her quest for better movie roles

-- or at least better parts than those which customarily fall to

Norma Shearer (whose husband, Irving Thalberg, is among the kingpins

at MGM).

This task is the job description of the septuagenarian Hearst,

dutifully enacted by Steven Gilborn, who throws his considerable

weight around the MGM offices -- and aims veiled threats at any

future co-stars who might harbor romantic inclinations toward Davies.

Hearst already has dispatched one of her former would-be lovers (see

the movie “The Cat’s Meow”).

Mayer, given a richly ethnic interpretation by Glenn Taranto,

wears his emperor’s mantle well. Taranto’s steely, powerful

performance epitomizes the tyrannical studio chief beautifully, as

does his paternal attitude toward recalcitrant stars.