“Job,” a surprise Off-Broadway hit from last season that has now transferred to Broadway, is essentially a scrambled and screaming monologue with an additional character who serves as an audience and a mystery shocker element thrown in.
Despite the ongoing financial difficulties still being experienced by New York theater companies since reopening after the pandemic shutdown, a handful of small commercial Off-Broadway shows managed to buck the odds and become sold-out hits last season.
One of them, “Oh, Mary!,” an unhinged campy farce written by and starring Cole Escola as an alternative history version of Mary Todd Lincoln, recently opened on Broadway, with its hilarity intact, and has once again become an unlikely smash.
“Dead Outlaw,” an unlikely musical comedy about a failed criminal whose preserved dead body became a source of entertainment for decades, is expected to materialize on Broadway next season.
And now comes “Job,” an 80-minute, two-hander psychological thriller written by the little-known Max Wolf Friedlich and starring Peter Friedman, a longtime veteran of New York theater who recently had a supporting role on the HBO drama “Succession” as the mild-mannered COO Frank Vernon, and Sydney Lemmon, who herself appeared on two episodes of “Succession” in a small role.
“Job” was first presented last fall at Soho Playhouse in Hudson Square. A few months later, it received an encore Off-Broadway run at the Connelly Theater in the East Village. Now it is receiving a limited run on Broadway by renting out the small Hayes Theater, which is now owned by the nonprofit Second Stage. “Forbidden Broadway” was originally expected to play the Hayes this summer but had to bow out due to financial difficulties.
The play begins abruptly with Jane (Lemmon), a young woman who works for a tech company and recently endured a mental breakdown in public that went viral, tentatively brandishing a gun toward Loyd (Friedman), a therapist who has been hired to assess whether she is ready to return to work. Sudden blackouts follow, depicting what appear to be alternative paths forward for the pair.
Eventually, “Job” transitions into an initial therapy session, with the manic and over-stressed Jane going into the details of her life in response to Loyd’s gentle questioning. However, the sense of realism is occasionally disrupted by hallucinatory visions and sounds. Eventually, the situation flips due to some deeply troubling accusations, which I won’t spoil.
“Job” hits upon a lot of timely and urgent issues including mental health, the “tech bro” culture of Silicon Valley startups, how the internet disorients one’s sense of reality, and the divide between aging “Boomers” and Millennials and Generation Z. It could appeal to the kind of young urban professionals personified by its main character.
Regretfully, I did not see “Job” during its earlier runs, and I suspect that it was probably more exciting to see it in a more intimate downtown space. On Broadway, the production (as directed by Michael Herwitz) looks empty and the play feels underwritten. It dumps compelling societal concerns upon us, leaves them unexplored, and relies structurally on an uninspired starting point (i.e. confessing to a therapist) and gimmicks.
Even so, Lemmon vividly captures her character’s raw nerves and paranoia, depicting a young woman on the verge of total hysteria but who is nevertheless trying to cogently explain herself and feel out her questioner, while an understated Friedman tries to stay calm and professional despite the clear and present danger presented by his new client, with occasional indications of his character’s serious issues.
Hayes Theater, 240 W. 44th St., jobtheplay.com. Through Sept. 29.
