Perspectives on ‘Making It’ in America

Joe Hortua’s “Making It” is set in a Manhattan restaurant with upscale aspirations. The only strong opinion a customer has about the food is that it’s bland.

Likewise, Hortua’s play--despite its upscale production at South Coast Repertory--needs fresher, more complementary ingredients, or at least a dash of something to eliminate the feeling that this play was assembled from a recipe.

As it is, the recipe goes like this:

Take two immigrant busboys--one (Dileep Rao) who’s sweet on America, the other one (Assaf Cohen) bitter. Set them aside on one end of the stage.

At the other end of the stage, plant one middle-aged, boozy restaurant owner (Jennifer Griffin), whose funk apparently stems from the fact that she gave up acting to own a swank eatery. Stir in a new, young waiter (Heath Freeman), an otherwise starving actor. Note irony.

In the center of the stage, at the restaurant’s only visible table, park a young engaged couple. He (JD Cullum) is the talker, she (Laura Hinsberger) is the listener, even though they’re celebrating her birthday. After an hour or so, add his middle-aged, playwriting mentor (Nicholas Hormann), the source of many of the young man’s current complaints.

Occasionally stir elements of these three sets of ingredients only inconsequentially, but keep all of them on stage--with two of the three arenas in shadow at any given time, while the lights are up on the third.

The result is a play that feels half-baked.

Hortua intends to offer a spectrum of opinions on the subject of “making it” in today’s America, but his characters are stereotyped mouthpieces for varying perspectives. The busboys, in particular, are so generic in their assigned attitudes that we never learn where they emigrated from. They are programmed so schematically that the play begins and ends with the same line, “This is America, my friend”--spoken at the beginning by the one who’s happy with America and at the end by the other one, who has just described his initial glimpse of poverty in the Bronx. This sequence of viewpoints seems designed to convince a complacent, middle-class audience that America has problems after all--in other words, it feels patronizing as well as shallow.

The relationship between the restaurant owner and her new waiter is slightly more substantial, in that an unspoken element is at work here--she’s attracted to him, which complicates the dynamic between boss and employee. But these two characters are hardly more distinctive than the busboys. Is there a more common cliche than the waiter who really wants to act? Hortua hasn’t filled in any further details. As far as the owner goes, she tells an implausible story about why she left acting, and her eventual rise to her current status remains unexplained. The idea that someone might actually enjoy running a restaurant instead of acting is never seriously entertained.

The writing of the trio of diners appears to be designed to make us loathe the young man and his mentor, who are stand-ins for their respective generations at their worst. But the nature of their relationship is as vague as the nationalities of the busboys. The young woman emerges as the wise one in this group, but it’s unclear why someone so wise would ever go on a second date with the annoying young man, let alone marry him.

The play feels scattered and yet static. Despite its many narrative strands, the hustle and bustle of a Manhattan restaurant is missing--in contrast to the recent “Fully Committed,” which had only one actor, compared to this play’s seven. Constrained by the decision to keep all seven on stage, even when they’re in the shadows, director David Emmes hasn’t found this play’s pulse.

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“Making It,” South Coast Repertory Second Stage, 655 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa. Tuesdays-Fridays, 7:45 p.m.; Saturdays-Sundays, 2 and 7:45 p.m. Ends Feb. 24. $19- $51. (714) 708-5555. Running time: 2 hours.

Dileep Rao...Mo

Assaf Cohen...Haji

Jennifer Griffin...Dora

Heath Freeman...Jack

JD Cullum...Paolo

Laura Hinsberger...Claire

Nicholas Hormann...Leonard

By Joe Hortua. Directed by David Emmes. Set and costumes by Angela Balogh Calin. Lighting by Geoff Korf. Stage manager Vanessa J. Noon.