Magic/Bird

          Anyone who knows me well, or even a little, knows that "sports fan" is not a word that anyone would use to describe me unless it was opposite day and we were in first grade. It might shame my Boston based family for this to be made public, but I knew nothing about Larry Bird other than that he has bushy hair, is very tall, and played for the Celtics. I knew equally as much about Magic Johnson. I didn't even know that they had ever had a "rivalry".

        The play Magic/Bird would have very much benefited from an out of town production before coming to Broadway. I'm sure that the creative team would have learned a lot about the way they chose to tell this story, and may have fixed some of the obvious "kinks" in what could have been a very powerful story of friendship in the face of adversity.

        Magic/Bird takes place entirely on a basketball court. Not the action of the play, but rather different locations are depicted by bringing in different small pieces to establish a bar, a farm house, a locker room etc. The back wall is also lined with screens that show video images and projections of the real men themselves. All in all it was a very theatrical and affective way to tell the story.

        The real problems with this play are in the characters. The author Eric Simonson (who wrote last years better by comparison Lombardi) has failed to develop either of the main characters in way that lets the audience into who these men were, what made them dislike each other, and then what eventually drew them together.

         In addition to the lack of connection to the two star players, the supporting characters in Magic/Bird are all played by one white woman, one white man, and two black men. Normally this wouldn't be a problem, however, most of the characters these actors portray are so nondescript that they all seem to blend together and it's difficult to tell who each one is playing at what time.

        This is not a good play, however, it is a compelling story. For this non sports fan, it would have been so wonderful to see more of these two great athletes of our time and less of the people around them who didn't matter (random reporters, fans, TV execs etc). Also, very little time is spent on Magic Johnson discovery he is HIV positive. We see nothing of how it effected him. We see how it impacted him professionally, but nothing of the private struggle. Magics wife never makes an appearance on stage.

    All is all I went in expected to not like the play, but hopeful that if I kept my expectations low perhaps I might be surprised. All I left feeling was disappointed that this story didn't get told in the way that it deserved to be. Magic/Bird closed on Broadway at The Longacre Theater on May 12 after 37 performances.