Review of The Basics Fund Sponsored Artist, Jonson Y. Kuhn's, Manhattan's Last Fight (playing Friday-Sun Now through Sept 7th, 2008)

Posted: 12:00 AM, Fri, Aug 29 2008

"Last Fight" lacks KO, but it has potential

By John Moore
Denver Post Theater Critic

Article Last Updated: 08/28/2008 11:23:17 PM MDT

Brady Darnell, front, plays boxer Bobby in Crossroads Theatre's one-act play, "Manhattan's Last Fight," with, from left, Sam Gilstrap, Dayna Geiger, Patrick Ryan, Rich Sater and Ariana Griffith. ( Crossroads Theatre )

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Denver playwright Jonson Kuhn is trying something kinda crazy: He's staging his own new boxing play as an entreaty to his fellow young adults, those hipsters who are far more at home at the Bluebird Theater than the Buell Theatre.

(And if you don't know the difference, that's Kuhn's point: The former is home to rock concerts, the latter to national touring productions like "A Chorus Line.")

Kuhn is inviting the cool kids to give live theater a try by luring them with what they already love, which is live rock music.

"Manhattan's Last Fight" is just a bite-sized one-act, so every performance begins with a short set by the loud local rock band Tijuana Pillbox, followed by a short opening playlet, also written by Kuhn. Then,

The local band Tijuana Pillbox rocks out before every performance. (John Moore, The Denver Post )

the main event. Which is short. In fisticuffs parlance, we're talking three quick rounds.

The novelty of the programming makes for a casually festive kind of evening, and the short duration of "Manhattan's Last Fight" lessens the stakes for the actual play, which has its charms, but comes off us unfinished and a bit nebulous.

Kuhn, a prolific writer who's just in his mid-20s, made a strong impression last year with his oddly futuristic and apocalyptic Western simply titled "Denver."

"Manhattan's Last Fight" doesn't carry with it nearly the same stakes. It's a far more lighthearted and linear tale of a boxer named Bobby Manhattan whose neck is as red as it is thick. It's the eve of a big fight that comes with a huge payday, but Bobby has fled to White Cloud, Kan., just outside the reservation where his girl is, this day, to marry an Indian. She quit Bobby because Bobby wouldn't quit boxing.

Kuhn is a quirky writer with a strong voice, a unique world vision and a strong sense of both character and the Western region. But to see "Manhattan's Last Fight," you'd presume the play to be much more likely a precursor to "Denver" than its followup. It lacks the metaphor, the allegory, the artistic import of the former.

But it is a breezy comedy populated with likably stupid characters. From the moment we meet Brady Darnell's hard-headed (and oddly near-naked) Manhattan in his remote hotel room, you empathize. More accurately: He's passed out in a horse trough filled with empty beer cans. Soon he's joined, voluntarily or otherwise, by a colorful array, including his dumb copper brother, a stripper, his former gal and her current fiance. Some of the support work is a bit sketchy, though Kuhn himself provides a brief but memorable cameo.

Unlike "Denver," this play doesn't cover any particularly new territory. It does provide moments of nice physical comedy and a great opportunity for Darnell to show off.

But it's hard to get a fix on the setting of this play. It's present- day, but it feels for all the world like 40 years ago. Bobby, who could pass more for an old-fashioned carnival wrestler than a modern pugilist, talks about drive-in dates watching Frank Sinatra's 1965 "Von Ryan's Express." Mona the stripper strips to the old warhorse "Luck Be a Lady."

More consternating is the ending. The play does not necessarily end happily, and in no way is it obliged to. But it ends as a first act might, not as might a completed play � at whatever length. That's why I say "necessarily." The play's not done, just incomplete. The script even says so.

Its final words read, "End of Act I � To be continued." And that's a bit of a gyp, because the audience is never apprised that this is merely the first half of a work in progress. Then again, the audience isn't apprised of much, as there are no programs.

Still, this is a promising, unassuming night at the theater. One the cool kids might like. In boxing parlance, call it a draw.

John Moore: 303-954-1056 or jmoore@denverpost.com

"Manhattan's Last Fight" ** (out of four stars)

One-act play. Crossroads at Five Points Theatre, 2590 Washington St. Written by Jonson Kuhn. Preshow music by Tijuana Pillbox. Total program 2 hours. Through Sept. 7. 7:30 p.m. Fridays-Sundays. $12. 303-832-0929, denvercrossroads.com.