2-11-RAX-BevHillPsych

THE BEVERLY HILLS PSYCHIATRIST, currently playing at the Lounge Theatre in Hollywood, certainly has “name appeal”. I expected an uproarious satire on the world of psychiatry; a no-holds-barred comedy on the trials of mounting the couch every week for a therapy session on Rodeo Drive. What I got was an incredibly boring and repetitive series of blackout sketches depicting a patient’s one year journey through the worst psychoanalysis the American Psychiatric Association (if there is such a group) has to offer.	Lene Pedersen
In Cornelius Schnauber’s long one-act, a successful writer, played by Tony Motzenbacker, comes to The Beverly Hills Psychiatrist, played by Alexander Zale, to gain full insight into his psyche. What he gets is prescriptions for Paxil and Valium, and a year long explanation that what the shrink is shooting for is to construct his patient’s “mosaic”. The Doctor doesn’t remember from week to week, the status of the case, or even what medications he’s got his patient on. Total ineptness, which does not make for good satire, which has to have one foot in reality. After twenty months, the shrink’s RX is to pass his patient on to a colleague who will help him find a new mosaic.
Alexander Zale - Tony Motzenbacker	The actors, Motzenbacker and Zale, seem to be as bored with the material as the material is boring. Motzenbacker is stuck in a sort of confused anger while Zale just recites his lines with no feeling for the absurd. I suppose one could fault director Louis Fantasia with not digging deeper in order to make this piece more humorously palatable. At some point during rehearsals, somebody should have said, “This thing needs some life”.
The play is followed by a monologue from another Schnauber play, HIGHWAY ONE. Lene Pedersen plays Jessica, an opera star in a reflective mood as she prepares to go onstage for a final rehearsal of “Aida”. Schnauber’s writing is just as tedious in this piece as it is in the former. THE BEVERLY HILLS PSYCHIATRIST plays now through March 6, 2011, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 PM, Sundays at 3 PM. Tickets are $20, Students and Seniors $15. Call (323) 960-4418 or visit www.plays411.com/beverlyhills Comments? Write to us at: Letters@ReviewPlays.Com