(2 of 2)
The other actors are bland, save for Cynthia Mace as the Mormon's deranged ; wife, but her role starts at a mountaintop of emotional frenzy and leaves her nowhere to go. As a gay man who deserts a dying lover, Joe Mantello projects a nihilism far more intriguing than Stephen Spinella's saintliness as the lover, although Spinella has the almost unplayable task of being visited by angels, ascending to heaven and returning to earth -- alive despite two apparent death scenes -- to bless the multitudes. Kushner has said the play's second half is two drafts away from being done. He should focus on this character and the banal finale if he wants to be poetically -- rather than just politically -- correct.
