By Harry Haun
12 Oct 2009

Mercedes Ruehl, who was last in the Golden rivaling a goat for Pullman's affections in Edward Albee's Tony-winning The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia?, missed the paparazzi coming and going, arriving last minute at the theatre and late to the party, but she was overflowing with praise for Pullman: "He never dropped his concentration for a second, and the climax consequently was a huge payoff. He was really, really marvelous. We were talking about it an hour after we left the theatre. I'm in no position to be proud of him, but I'm proud of him."

Not many actors can make a convincing case for goat love — and Pullman followed that with another arduous Albee opus, Peter and Jerry, in which he provoked a stranger in the park to kill him. Now, this! "I don't know why, but these are the roles that I'm getting in New York," he shrugged haplessly. "There are times when it feels very energizing to play these characters, but they are wringers."

He is happy to have finally settled into a regular Broadway run. "Now that we're doing it on a fairly good rhythm, there's a certain weight you feel that comes beforehand. You never know quite how it's going to go. It's so clichι that these plays are different every night, but this one has really different audiences. Sometimes they are absolutely quiet, and then other times they're raucous as hell, and they'll try to take the play away from you. Some people are just shocked. It's awkwardly awful, and then other times people are going, 'Yeah.' I can't believe the blood-lusting out there."

And does he believe that, from the very beginning, Carol was a calculating Circe bent on John's destruction? "For my money, outside the play," he said, "it doesn't quite seem like she came in with such an agenda, but she's had another agenda all her life. People who live in anger, I think, choose to stay there because it activates them."

The self-assured, self-activated Ms. Stiles didn't seem remotely burned out by her blowtorch performance. "It's exhilarating, actually," she replied coolly. "After the show is over, I have so much energy because you get really fired up during it. It's a very aerobic show, too — very physical — so I always feel, because I do so much screaming and crying, it's cathartic, and I come out of the show feeling terrific."

It troubled her not a whit that the audience is usually not in her corner. "I think it's a really liberating thing to be playing a character that doesn't care if people like her. She's so confrontational and aggressive, and it's beyond the point of compromise."

But she and Pullman fine-tune their performances from night to night. "Some nights, it's different. Some nights you can see there's maybe a little connection with the two characters or there's a moment where they might come to terms, and then some nights it's a full-out brawl. Tonight, I felt Bill and I were communicating. The audience seemed hip to the play so I think they came in with preconceived ideas. I could hear a lot of dissatisfaction with my character."

Did she notice how Carol's vocabulary improved after she filed a report against John with the tenure committee? She nodded yes. "That was always the question people had in L.A. People would say, 'Well, how come she doesn't understand anything, and then later she's so articulate?' — so I actually changed my mind about the character. I thought, 'Well, what if I go into the first scene thinking that sometimes she doesn't understand and so she doesn't agree with him?' You know, you can say, 'I don't understand,' but, if you say it with the subtext 'I don't agree with you,' what you're saying is illogical and she's smart from the get-go." Also, she admitted her character could be getting a little coaching on the sidelines by vested interests. "One thing the play is critical of, or points out, is that people feel empowered when other people are telling them they're right — he's propped up by the institution, she's propped up by her group — and the idea that there's power in numbers is dangerous.

"David Mamet and his wife, Rebecca Pidgeon, who was the original Carol, came to opening night in L.A., and they were enthusiastic. I think that they like that we had our own interpretation of the play. He sent me notes, but I don't think he wants to influence my take on it."

Old TV co-stars (Ana Gasteyer and Chris Parnell of "Saturday Night Live") and new (Edie Falco and Paul Schulze of "Nurse Jackie") led the opening-night guest-list. Gasteyer was also representing The Royal Family, as was — majestically — Rosemary Harris. "I saw Ana on opening night, and she's fantastic," raved Parnell, who admitted it gave him a hankering to do theatre. "I'm a little chicken. I've been away from it for so long. It takes certain muscles that I'm not sure I have toned right now. I hope I get the opportunity to."

Vanessa Carlton, a pop-music pal of Stiles', showed up as did Eddie Kaye Thomas of "American Pie," who went to high school with Stiles. "This show is what I love about the theatre," opted the latter. "It's a wonderful example of how theatre can settle you into your seat and then kick you in the teeth."

In Hughes' camp: Kate Jennings Grant ("I'm not a Fiancιe. I'm The Girlfriend. Everyone's marrying me off"), who just returned from filming "Love and Other Drugs" with Jake Gyllenhaal in Pittsburgh, and Hughes' actress mom, Helen Stenborg, who had missed his Royal Family opening because she was gainfully employed Off-Broadway (in Vigil at the DR2). A buddy of Hughes, Chris Pine of the last "Star Trek" feature, caught the Oleanna opening in L.A. but decided to skip this one rather than endure the paparazzi-pelting he got when he attended the Royal Family launching.

Also attending: Alan Alda, in town working on a PBS science show, and wife Arlene Weiss, who writes children books and illustrates them with her photographs ("Hello, Goodbye," from Tundra Press, is her latest), Sherri Shepherd from "The View," Vogue's editor Anna Wintour with her pretty daughter (who's not an actress but an intern at Manhattan Theatre Club) and Heather Randall with director Ethan McSweeny.

Most conspicuously, and predictably, M.I.A. was Mamet himself, a notorious no-show for his Broadway openings. He was believed to be on the West Coast but was expected to be in town in time for Pidgeon's night at Joe's Pub on Oct. 15. Then, he gets to work directing his latest opus for Broadway, Race, with James Spader, Richard Thomas and Kerry Washington. It opens Dec. 6, giving him — for two seasons in a row — two plays on Broadway.