The Old Man and the Pool
Reviewed by Katie Buenneke
Mark Taper Forum
Through August 28
RECOMMENDED
Mike Birbiglia is not dead. But you would be forgiven for thinking otherwise while watching his show that’s currently playing at the Taper. Yes, he’s standing in front of you, performing a comedy set, but the way he talks about his health, you might be tempted to think this is a posthumous monologue. Thankfully, though, Mike Birbiglia is alive and well, and here to perform his latest comedy set.
Though it takes place in the Mark Taper Forum downtown, a venue typically home to plays and one-person shows, The Old Man and the Pool is more of a finessed stand-up routine than a typical night out at the theater. This shouldn’t come as a surprise to most audiences; Birbiglia’s last show in L.A., The New One, played at the Ahmanson, another Center Theatre Group venue, in 2019, but is now streaming as a comedy special on Netflix.
Still, Birbiglia is a gifted storyteller, with acute comic timing. That’s not unexpected; this show is in a rolling premiere of sorts. He performed it for a few weeks at the Berkeley Rep at the beginning of the year, and another few weeks at Steppenwolf in Chicago in the late spring, so by this point, the show is a well-oiled machine.
The throughline of the show is Birbiglia’s journey towards exercise. A few years ago, Birbiglia did a breath test during his annual physical, and the results concerned his doctor enough that the doctor suggested he take up swimming or some other form of cardio five times a week. He’s resistant to the idea, and especially resistant to his local pool, which is highly chlorinated and at a nearby YMCA, but as he goes on tangents about his own medical and athletic history and his family medical history, he comes to the conclusion that, unsurprisingly, the doctor was right, and the pool isn’t so bad.
Given that it’s just him up on stage, with some subtle and elegant projections by Hana Kim and an overly crisp costume designed by Toni-Leslie James, the show relies on Birbiglia’s charisma, of which he has plenty. Many contemporary stand-up specials feature comedians daring the audience to “cancel” them by utilizing humor that punches down or offends. That’s not the case here; Birbiglia’s jokes are almost exclusively at his own expense, aside from an extended bit about an unknown man who drowned. In fact, that bit was the only sour moment of the night for me; while the manner in which the anonymous man died is darkly humorous, I was uncomfortable being invited to laugh at the circumstances of someone’s last moments, which must have been terrifying. But everyone has different sensitivity levels about such things, and Birbiglia isn’t so much mocking the man’s death as he is holding a mirror to the audience, inviting us to examine why we, or the people around us, are laughing.
If you’re looking for a dependable night of laughs with a polished comic, The Old Man and the Pooldelivers that easily. They’re just not easygoing laughs; the show centers mortality and, with great intention, provokes discomfort, in the moments between the jokes.
The Mark Taper Forum, 135 N. Grand Ave., downtown; Tues. through Fri. at 8 p.m., Sat. at 2:30 and 8 p.m., Sunday at 1 and 6:30 p.m., thought August 28. CenterTheatreGroup.org. Running time: 77 minutes.
