Broadway review by Adam Feldman
How well do you know Sean Hayes? You probably think of him as a master of broad comedy, as he demonstrated in 11 seasons as Jack on Will & Grace (and as Jerry in Martin and Lewis and Larry in The Three Stooges). Maybe you enjoy his good-natured enthusiasm on the podcast Smartless. Maybe you saw him quip, scowl and play classical piano in his Tony-winning portrayal of Oscar Levant in Broadway’s Good Night, Oscar. Even so, you might still be surprised by how well he plays a basically regular guy in The Unknown: Elliott, a somewhat isolated, somewhat depressed, mostly sober middle-aged writer who has been having a hard time devising a screenplay, perhaps because his own life has so little drama.
David Cale’s one-man play whips some up for him. While clearing his head at a rural retreat, Elliott hears someone singing a love song about romantic disappointment—a song that Elliott wrote years earlier for a musical. When he returns to the city, a seemingly chance encounter with a handsome Texan at a West Village gay bar leads to a growing fear that he is being shadowed by a marginal figure from his past—and/or, perhaps, by that man’s identical twin. On Hayes’s old sitcom, this scenario might have been played for laughs: Jack and the Bein’ Stalked. Instead, it spirals into a dark-hued exploration of obsession and the porous line that separates life from art.
The Unknown | Photograph: Courtesy Emilio Madrid
Elliott's journey, however, doesn’t travel far beyond old neighborhoods. Under Leigh Silverman’s capable direction, Hayes maintains a sense of low-key intimacy even when he’s putting on accents and affects; the groundedness of his not-quite-reliable narration helps draw us into a suspense plot whose turns are not always convincing or unexpected: Even at a slim 65 minutes, the show seems to run out of new ground to cover, and it culminates in a twist so tired that I may have actually yawned. Hayes is always good company, but a thriller can only go so far into the familiar.
The Unknown. Studio Seaview (Off Broadway). By David Cale. Directed by Leigh Silverman. With Sean Hayes. Running time: 1hr 5mins. No intermission.
Follow Adam Feldman on X: @FeldmanAdam
Follow Adam Feldman on Bluesky: @FeldmanAdam
Follow Adam Feldman on Threads: @adfeldman
Follow Time Out Theater on X: @TimeOutTheater
Keep up with the latest news and reviews on our Time Out Theater Facebook page
The Unknown | Photograph: Courtesy Emilio Madrid
