If you're looking for a high tech show, featuring a character with superhuman powers, travel to Arlington instead of NYC and save yourself some money.  The American Century Theater's latest offering of twentieth-century classics, Gore Vidal's Visit to a Small Planet (1957), once again gives this company an opportunity to match its consistent design and interpretive skills with a literate script. 

How would an outsider (a cockeyed one at that) - from another time and place - view the social structure of the day?  Well, Mr. Vidal's satire of the Eisenhower era, which features an Ozzie & Harriet-type family, an incompetent military command, and a corporate-media conglomerate seems to look like another world.  And yet, and yet ... how things have changed!

A miscalculation by a time-traveling Civil War buff named Kreton (Bruce Alan Rauscher) lands him in the right place in the wrong century at the Spelding residence - in Virginia no less - home of TV anchor Roger (Steve Lebens), his wife Reba (Kelly Cronenberg), and daughter Ellen (Megan Graves).  General Tom Powers (John Tweel) is quickly on the scene for what he hopes is a career-making coup while Ellen's boyfriend (Noah Bird) is seeking another type of advancement.   What follows is a series of miscommunications and power struggles along a variety of fronts until the deus ex machina arrival of Delton 4 (Tamra Lynn Testerman) sorts them out.     

Director Rip Claassen gives Visit an absurdist tone which suits the time and temperament of the play and his choreography is graceful as it is fluid.  Great attention to detail is given to every element of the design and production, each of which serves the needs of the play.  Noel Greer's expansive set, which sprawls into two side spaces, is delightfully stocked with period pieces by properties designer Ceci Albert.  The lighting of Micah Stromberg and costumes of Rosalie Ferris compete for excellence, but sound designer Ed Moser steals the show, employing every trick of the trade, to pull off the play's magic. 

That same consideration is applied to the realization of the characters.  Mr. Rauscher is sensational in his portrayal of Kreton, the space traveler.  His fussy little mannerisms, to connect with his new friends, and droll assessments of the emotional landscape of a world which he can understand but not feel, are poetry in motion.  Ms.  Cronenberg mines all subtext of housewifely discontent - sexual frustration being at the forefront.  Going the opposite way, her stage daughter Ms. Graves and her beau farmer Mr. Bird give new meaning to animal husbandry - from their first lip-locked moment.  Ms. Graves is a poised and comic presence throughout.  Mr. Lebens and Mr. Tweel are Frick `n Frack partners - husband and general, respectively - who may be sharing each other's dreams along with a particular wife.   Each of their characters, however, has been relegated to somewhat of a subordinate role with the staged production, while a number of other actors wander in and out of the scenes, serving as props or stage business.

Visit started out as a television play (1955), which was fairly linear in its presentation of character and plot.  These were always Mr. Vidal's strongest suits in historical fiction and essays, of which he is a master.  In moving to the stage, however, he has rearranged sequences, perhaps in deference to the collaborative nature of theater or the stars in supporting parts.  Dramaturgically, it works to withhold the most interesting character initially, but the storyline gets obscured at the outset.  But by rewriting the secondary characters - opening them up for the stage - they and their subplots start to take over the action to the detriment of the central story.  By the mid-point of the second act, the action starts to flag and does not really recover until Mr. Rauscher re-emerges in the third.  On Broadway, Mr. Vidal started down a slippery slope which continued in Hollywood with the making of a Jerry Lewis movie (1960). Sci-Fi turned into a broad comedy turned into slapstick or farce.

Still, there's plenty of punch in this production to surmount the rough edges.  Great design, a notable lead performance, intelligent direction, and a fine ensemble cast bring this off.  With Visit TACT demonstrates the art of the possible.

Additional cast:  Brendan A. Haley, Kecia A. Campbell, and Peter Louis Johnson

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Applause meter:  Recommended, 3 ½ + hands (out of 5) for general audiences.  Actors will want to see Mr. Rauscher's command performance and designers will want to takes notes on the technical features of the production.

Moment of the play:  Mr. Rauscher's turn with Rosemary the Cat at the top of Act II.

Stars of the play: 1) Bruce Alan Rauscher as Kreton, 2) (tied) Director Rip Claassen & Sound Designer Ed Moser, and 3) Megan Graves as Ellen Spelding.

Runtime:  2:15 w/2 intermissions

Photo credit:  Dennis Deloria