(L-R) Danny Burstein, Zoe Wanamaker, Nathan Lane (Julieta Cervantes, 2023)

 

Pictures From Home

By Fern Siegel

 

The veracity of photographs is always debatable. Is the image a true reflection of the subject? Or does subjectivity read meaning into a still image? It is impossible to strip an image of its dual perspective.

 

That understanding gets clearer — and blurrier — when it involves family photos, a medium that Larry Sultan devoted a decade of his life to curating.

 

Now on Broadway at Studio 54, Pictures From Home, boasts a stellar cast: Nathan Lane, Zoe Wanamaker and Danny Burstein. Playwright Sharr White dramatizes Sultan’s exhibition of the same name from 1992, part of a retrospective of his work at LACMA, Los Angeles Contemporary Museum of Art, which was also published as a book.

 

Although, in fairness to the tapes, home movies and photos, the play feels more like a touching adaptation.

 

Pictures From Home covers multiple themes — from success to aging, parents and children, the reality of long marriages and the art of making art — with genuine feeling.

 

Larry Sultan’s (Burstein) photo-memoir captures nearly 10 years of parental portraits in Los Angeles, from 1982-1992. There are not only the requisite staged shots, but stills from Super-8 home movies shot decades earlier.

 

All are projected on the living room wall, accompanied by commentary from his father Irving (Lane). And the remarks are often priceless. His parents are frustrated by their son’s endless weekend visits. But the real point of contention: His father is unnerved by photos he feels do not truthfully reflect their life.

 

In fact, it’s Irving’s exasperation that often invokes an earlier play, Death of a Salesman, which also addressed fathers, sons and the sales ethos.

 

Irv is a salesman, a poor man who worked hard and eventually rose to become a vice president at Schick. Though more successful than Willie Loman, the two share key experiences. Their connection is the American quest for financial success. Arthur Miller wrote in “Death of a Salesman”: “A salesman has got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory.”

 

Irv’s dream was primal: survival. His success was due to charm, energy and drive. One scene has Irv explaining to the audience how to sell, and that brief presentation is mesmerizing.

 

“Let me tell you a secret about jobs,” Irv tells Larry, whose artistic project aggravates the former executive. “If nobody can fire you from doing something, then it’s not a job.” The comic exasperation is vintage Lane — but under the laugh line is a larger truth.

 

And in case Larry’s missed his father’s feelings about image vs. reality, he adds: “The image of success, Larry, didn’t buy you every fucking thing you had your entire life,” explodes Irv. “Actual success did.”

 

The parental tension is acute. And every bit as sharp as the color-drenched photos of Larry’s life. Yes, there is life beyond the frame, yet within it, the post-war era of American prosperity is captured in sunny California moments. The cost of that prosperity is part of the photo-memoir’s exploration. And that’s where Jean injects her own sense of worth, as wife, mother and independent woman.

 

Danny Burstein (Julieta Cervantes, 2023)

 

Jean, played by Wanamaker with an edgy, insightful sensibility, is acutely aware of what her husband’s work cost their marriage. She’s equally concerned that Larry leaves his own family regularly to visit his parents. Where is his sense of familial responsibility? What is he ultimately searching for?

 

Similarly, Lane supplies humor, an expressive face and delivers an intense performance. Burstein, the attentive son, navigates between his parents with tenderness, but it’s clear his photo pursuits are also driven by his own psychological needs. 

 

Sultan searched for answers in visual images, looking for the story behind the moment. A happy face may hide a miserable one seconds later. Conversely, what appears as frustration to one viewer may be seen as worry by the actual subject.  

 

Pictures From Home raises serious questions, including: Do we see others as they see themselves? Do we see ourselves truthfully? The curation of photos, not unlike the curation of social-network profiles, belies the search for truth. We often dismiss or delete anything that runs counter to a carefully created script.

 

To Sultan’s artistic credit, he’s not afraid to delve into unpleasantness or ask for answers to uncomfortable questions. Under Bartlett Sher’s direction, the powerhouse trio provide a compelling, often hypnotic and occasionally discomforting reality. What appears as ordinary photos, in their hands, produces moving theater.

 

Pictures From Home, Studio 54, 245 W. 54 St

Running Time: 1 hour, 45 minutes, no intermission

Tickets: www.picturesfromhomebroadway.com