Staircase

If some plays had fuel gauges attached to them, their needles would indicate half full. The full half of Staircase, which opened on Broadway last week, contains uncompromisingly fine acting by the two-man cast, Eli Wallach and Milo O'Shea, and a decent quota of amusing though not wildly funny lines. The empty half consists of scanty action, no character development, and a drowsy repetitiveness that comes from distending a potentially compact one-acter into a full-length play. The comedy concerns two aging homosexual barbers and is unlikely to offend any one, except possibly barbers.

Charlie (Wallach) is a failed vaudevillian; Harry (O'Shea) was a scoutmaster until his penchant for boys was discovered. On a cheerless Sunday evening in the dismal London suburb of Brixton, they are in their barbershop giving each other the full tonsorial treatment. This Sunday is particularly cheerless, since Charlie has been summoned to trial for "impersonating a female" in a club known as the Adam's Apple, and may face a jail sentence. Since the confrontation never does take place, the play's electricity is static: tingles of apprehension but no real voltage of menace or depravity.

The pair bicker and spat -- then tenderly, or joshingly, make up; it is apparent that the glue of their domestic relationship is mutual need. That is reflected in the acting of Wallach and O'Shea, who are matchlessly mated to their roles. Exquisitely coiffed, Wallach is superbly narcissistic, as if he were modeling for an effete art agency. Fat, defensive, submissive, O'Shea would appear to have the lesser part, but he proves himself the better actor in creating an image of a patient, badgered man too good to be untrue to his bullying friend.

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