Steve Martin is a many-splendored thing, moving from stand-up comic to TV and movies to banjo virtuoso while writing a few plays along the way. His most popular play is a ninety-minute jeu d’esprit called Picasso at the Lapin Agile. Set in Paris in 1904 in a bar where painters and other bohemian types like to hang out, the play improbably brings together Pablo Picasso and Albert Einstein (if memory serves me correctly, Einstein was in Switzerland at the time). One year later, Einstein would publish The Special Theory of Relativity, changing the way physicists looked at the world. Three years later, Picasso would paint “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon,” changing the way painters looked at the world. By making a few marks – a formula, a sketch – on a piece of paper, these two men profoundly influenced the century that was just beginning.

In Steve Martin’s hands, not just Einstein and Picasso but all those hanging out at the Lapin Agile express their expectations for the 20th century, visions of the future that are as often a vehicle for easy irony as for serious reflection. The bar’s inhabitants also add more general observations on life and love, men and women, high culture and low culture. Some of these are cheap shots, some bear considerable substance, most are quite amusing. You’ll be glad you paid attention in Western Civ 101 and can pat yourself on the back when you get Martin’s jokes about art and science and politics. 

Though Martin does bring in a time-traveling visitor from the middle of the  century to wrap up the play with a final rueful comment, Picasso at the Lapin Agile doesn’t bother with much of a plot. It moves casually through a series of scenes between and among those who come and go in this watering hole. Under Cody Cole’s direction, the cast at the Kirkwood Theatre Guild vary in their success at bringing their characters to dramatic and theatrical life. Kelly Hougland’s Albert Einstein and Steve Looten’s Pablo Picasso debate the relative value of genius and talent. Hougland makes Einstein a man probably more comfortable in his lab and study, though he does try to make the most of the audience he now has. In contrast, I think Looten’s Picasso should be very comfortable before an audience, showing a larger ego and a bigger way of expressing it. 

Tori Shea Cole as Freddy, the owner and bartender of the Lapin Agile, and Jaelyn Hawkins as Germaine, the bar’s waitress, are in this production a lesbian couple, not a surprise in Montmartre: stick around, and Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas might drop by. Cole and Hawkins make Freddy and Germaine very lively characters; as hostess of both the bar and the theatre, Freddy sometimes addresses the audience directly.

Will Shaw dryly and charmingly plays Gaston, an older Frenchman, a regular at the bar with regrets for the snows of yesteryear and with bladder and prostate problems that send him frequently to the large toilet door that Matt Stuckell has located upstage center on his set. 

As Charles Dabernow Schmendiman, Ken Lopinot plays a young inventor with big plans and little ability. He is out of his league around Picasso and Einstein. Though, as one commentator noted, as Picasso represents Art for the new century and Einstein represents Science, Schmendiman could be said to represent Commerce.  

Robert Stevenson plays Picasso’s art dealer Sagot with sharp focus on making the sale. Rachel St. Moran’s beautiful young Suzanne is infatuated with Picasso. Melody Valen Quinn’s two roles, The Countess, with whom Einstein is infatuated as his intellectual equal, and A Female Admirer (though not of whom we expect) both have been given splendidly flattering costumes by Costume, Hair/Wig, & Makeup Designer Abby Pastorello. Ken Lopinot returns as the Visitor.

Katie Smith is the Stage Manager, Miriam Whatley is the Production Manager, and Stephanie Robinson is the Technical Director. Katie Smith designed props , Ryan Thorp the lighting, and Steve Creamer the sound. The revelation of “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon” lacked clarity and the Visitor’s appearance was not immersed in the deep mysteries of space. But Picasso at the Lapin Agile is both smart and fun.

—Bob Wilcox

Photo by Dan Donovan Photography