The expression “I don’t know whether to laugh or cry” could apply to playwright Stephen Adly Guirgis’ stage adaptation of “Dog Day Afternoon,” Sidney Lumet’s 1975 movie about an infamous, badly botched Brooklyn bank robbery in August 1972. Act One presents some hilarious scenes, most notably when the bank employee hostages debate what bakery has the best donuts as one of their captors negotiates with police to have some delivered. In this farcical exchange even the security guard (Danny Johnson), who has been lying on the bank floor with an apparent heart attack, rallies to put in his two cents. Act Two shifts into an anguished unrequited love, which, if the script were tighter, would be sad. Television favorite Jon Bernthal (“The Bear”) makes his Broadway debut under Rupert Goold’s direction at the August Wilson Theatre.
I was happy to see one of my favorite New York theatre actors, Jessica Hecht (in photo), as Colleen, the take-charge head teller. Even two armed men can’t intimidate her, but then these men -- Sonny (Bernthal) in the role played by Al Pacino in the film and Sal (Ebon Moss-Bachrach, also of “The Bear”) in the role played by John Cazale – are so obviously inept from the beginning that by the end of Act One the tellers and the manager, Mr. Butterman (Michael Kostroff), are sitting with Sonny watching TV and enjoying their donuts.
Act Two centers around Sonny's love for Leon (Esteban Andres Cruz) who lives and dresses as a woman and to whom Sonny considers himself married. Through both acts Sonny’s been negotiating with Detective Fucco (John Ortiz) who uses the phone at a nearby liquor store. Fucco humors him, promising he’s working on Sonny’s most outlandish request, a helicopter to take him to JFK and “a jumbo jet airliner with a full bar, stocked kitchen and reclining seats” to fly him, Sal and Leon to any country with no extradition agreement with the United States, opting for “Rhodesia or Algeria.” Leon, however, doesn’t want to go. The police have brought him from Bellevue Hospital to the liquor store phone. He arrives in a hospital gown, drugged out and complains, “I’ve never been so scared in my life, Sonny. One minute I’m in Bellevue relaxing and the next thing I know all these cops burst in.” That line drew a big laugh. No New Yorker would think that city public hospital would be a place where anyone would prefer to stay. Sonny sobs on the phone trying to convince him. Bernthal plays it well so it’s a shame Guirgis (who won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for drama for Between Riverside and Crazy) lets it drag on too long.
Set designer David Korins creates a realistic looking Chase Manhattan Bank outside, which rotates inside easily and alternates back and forth as needed.
The real life bank and the story unfolding around it captivated New Yorkers. The dog days of summer, an expression I don’t hear anymore, refer to the hot, humid days between early July and mid-August. I always thought it referred to the way we feel walking around New York City in that disgusting weather, like a dog panting with its tongue hanging out. (Actually it dates back to the ancient Greeks and Romans and their beliefs about the constellations and the sun at its peak.) In the time of the robbery, watching it unfold was a break from the news of the day, which centered around the Vietnam war and Watergate.
The real life Sonny, John Wojtowicz, served five years of a 20-year sentence. After he was paroled in 1978 he sold the movie rights for $7,500. He died of cancer in 2006.
