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Big Shot: a.k.a.: This is Not The Godfather

Reviewed by Deborah Klugman

Bootleg Theatre

Through June 6

Despite its subtitle, The Godfather is the inspiration for Theatre Movement Bazaar’s latest creation. Their show is billed as a theatrical collage, an appropriate description for a somewhat scattershot piece that features chunks of perceptive writing by Richard Alger and several highly watchable performances but doesn’t quite come together with the vision or inventiveness of some of their prior work.

If there’s a focal performance, it’s by Mark Skeens, who stands in for Michael Corleone, or as the performer explains it, Al Pacino playing Michael Corleone. Skeens’s Godfather-to-be is comic and brooding. Early scenes where he sets himself apart from his family are played with a satiric edge but also with an intensity that captures the schizophrenia of the original character.

There’s also fine comedic work by Paula Rebelo as Connie, Michael’s sister. One of strongest segments, in both writing and performance, is Rebelo’s monologue illustrating the subservient lot of the Mafia wife. She is also spot-on as a Sicilian dreamgirl whose undulations keep men in her thrall.

As Sonny, a dynamic David Guerra exudes the brute macho of the Mafia male. And in another well-written segment, Mark Doerr bemoans the outsider status of Corleone henchman Tom Hagen; no matter what he does, he can never be Italian.

Big Shot is most accessible when it’s commenting on gender inequality or family dynamics. It seems disjointed, however, and director Tina Kronis’s choreographed movement isn’t as integrated with the text as one might have wished.

Only a couple of months ago, the show was advertised as a work in progress. That still seems to be the case.

Bootleg Theater, 2220 Beverly Blvd., Westlake; Thurs.-Sat. 7:30 p.m.; through June 6. https://bootlegtheater.org