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Glengarry Glen Ross
by David Mamet
review in SF Bay Times by Jeff Smith
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Teatro Shalom is currently presenting David Mamet's dark comedy Glengarry Glen Ross at the Exit Theatre. Intimate but powerful theatre at its best, the play depicts cutthroat marketplace morality at its worst. If you have never seen one of the frequently produced stagings of this Pulitzer Prize-winning drama, or its all-star movie version, David Gassner's production is a must.
 
Four fast-talking real estate salesmen make a career of conning their clients, their fellow
salesmen, and themselves as they bilk retirees and working class rubes out of their disposable incomes and retirement savings in exchange for land parcels which may be waist deep in duck weed, bull rushes, and water hyacinths or wind blown cactus plantations.
 
Shelley Levene, superbly performed by Sal Bovoso, is an on-the-ropes, fading-fast salesman who sustains himself by impressing the office staff with his past sales records. Desperate to break a protracted losing streak and "get on the board," he is conned into robbing the sales office of its coveted client leads. David Acevedo as Roma, the fast-talking, hot-shot golden boy of the office and Lol Levy as Moss, the disgruntled instigator of the theft, are particularly adept at plumbing Mamet's broken fragments of obscenity-laced dialogue. Ron Obregon's brusque detective is a force to be reckoned with.
 
Rich with irony and metaphor, the play is a devastating illustration of the addictive nature of a random reward system in which a few winning pay-offs are enough to keep a fraternity of hustlers hooked on the art of the con. Pared down staging, brisk pacing, and an impressive reading of Mamet's cutting edge script by the seven actors distinguish this dog-devouring-dog morality tale.
 
Glengarry Glen Ross continues Thursdays-Saturdays, 8 pm, through July 31 at
the Exit Theatre. Call 415/602-4387.
 
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