A Theoretical Physicist and a Painter Walk into a Bar …: “Picasso at the Lapin Agile,” at the Richmond Hill Barn Theatre through August 30

Steve Martin, who celebrated his 81st birthday last week, cannot be stopped. That’s a good thing.

I’ve been a fan since his SNL debut. In those arrow-through-the-head days, I could recite his first two comedy albums from memory. (Made me so popular.) He’s a juggler; close-up magician; banjoist; TV writer; stand-up comedian; composer; recording artist; stage, film, and TV actor; author; director; producer; and series creator. Oh – and playwright. His Picasso at the Lapin Agile premiered at Chicago’s legendary Steppenwolf Theatre Company in 1993. It then opened at the Promenade Theatre in 1995, winning the Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Off-Broadway Play. Now, it’s at the Richmond Hill Barn Theatre, directed, appropriately, by another talented polymath, Jennifer Kingry, who is also her show's light and sound designer and operator (Q.E.D.).

Taking my seat innocent of particulars, the way I prefer it, I expected tilted perspectives from this comedy, dollops of weirdness in interesting flavors, and surprising turns. Yeah, it was all that, but it was askew in unexpected ways, too. It was intellectual discourse as absurdist vaudeville by way of Monty Python. Or perhaps Ernie Kovacs in neon turnout gear tap-dancing on a glass Escher staircase. (By the way, check out Steve tapping and singing with Gregory Hines on YouTube – amazing). And the fourth wall? What fourth wall? Self-referential meta-theatre ploys wage stealth attacks on the audience like mosquitoes. By the time you notice the tiny, piercing strike, it’s gone.

Set in 1904 at a real-life Paris boîte that's still open, and which Picasso actually frequented, Picasso at the Lapin Agile features Justin Raver as famed artist Pablo Picasso and fellow Reader theatre reviewer Mischa Hooker as theoretical physicist Albert Einstein. Both are well-done, earnest, energetic portrayals, and the actors play off one another with casual panache. Though the characters were sometimes at odds, they felt like real colleagues pursuing similar truths, though wielding their pencils for different purposes. (Steve, incidentally, is a serious art collector.)

Matthew McConville plays Lapin Agile owner and barman Freddy, and Bruce Carmen is barfly Gaston – both acting considerably more light-hearted here, though just as drink-centric, than when I’d first seen them onstage. That was in Richmond Hill's 2023 The Seafarer (one of my all-time favorite productions, and directed by Picasso portrayer Raver), when their wholly appropriate moods were resentful, vindictive, and malevolent. Here, their airs are convivial and largely good-natured, and Carmen deploys his character’s quips about his worsening lot in life with genuine cheeriness.

As waitress Germaine, Tori House contributes extensively and enthusiastically to the meandering discussion throughout. Kassidy Holdridge is captivating as Suzanne, one of those people who walks into a room talking about themselves endlessly as if all should hang on her every word – and we do. Holdridge also plays The Countess, likewise magnetic, whose demeanor is that of a woman perhaps twice Suzanne’s age. The roles aren’t expressly meant to be the same person, but given that they are often played by the same actor, as here, and the time-travel element that enters the play later (or was it earlier?), my fan theory is that Suzanne decided Einstein looked fun, and learned how to time-travel so she could hang out with him.

Andy Schaser is just as engaging playing art dealer Sagot. Sure, the guy is mercenary, but we all gotta eat, and we can’t all be geniuses. Sagot and bar-owner Freddy, by the way, were based on – or at least bore the names and professions of – real people in Picasso’s life. On the other hand, as Charles Dabernow Schmendiman, Samuel Carrington is a force of nature created from whole cloth of questionable taste, and all the funnier for it. (Dare I say Schmendiman is a wild and crazy guy? I dare.) Shyan DeVoss portrays A Female Admirer for all she’s worth during her brief stage time, while velvet-voiced Victor Angelo enacts A Visitor from the future, also a real person, and wow – impeccable casting and portrayal! (Angelo's is the play's only character whom Steve met in real life.)

Writing in the 1990s, Martin was trying to say … something … about the 20th century. Not sure what. For me, the weakest aspect of the Picasso at the Lapin Agile script was how its author strained to twist a bunch of stuff together, like long, skinny balloons, into a pithy, cohesive shape expressive of the entire hundred-year span. (Incidentally, Steve can make balloon animals in real life.) Others who can make things in real life include tireless set builders Mike Skiles and Jim Skiles – Jim also created special props for the show. And whistles and applause for costumer Suzanne Rakestraw; these are natty duds you can’t just pick up at Goodwill. Anyway, you’ll likely enjoy the production more if you studied philosophy, like Steve did. But there is unequivocally enough fun to be had if you just sit back and let both deep and shallow subject matter wash over you.

Picasso at the Lapin Agile runs at the Richmond Hill Barn Theatre (600 Robinson Drive, Geneseo IL) through August 30, and more information and tickets are available by calling (309)944-2244 and visiting RHPlayers.com.