By Bart Greenberg***A new play by Gary Morgenstein, A Tomato Can’t Grow in the Bronx, tells the tale of a Jewish family looking to escape their changing neighborhood by a move to Huntington, Long Island. It is strangely reminiscent of the classic play in current revival, A Raisin in the Sun, wherein a possible relocation reveals the fractured relationships within the family. What seems like a happy group of people, perhaps a bit stressed, cracks apart with long-held animosities revealed. Some vivid characters are offered up, and inhabited by some fine actors. The time and place of the play—The Bronx, New York in 1968—are very well evoked in the production with just enough cultural references to fill in the background.
Unfortunately, there is an uncertainty in the writing as to what sort of play Morgenstein wants the work to be. Beginning as a sitcom, the story slowly slides into kitchen sink drama, and then in the second act ,set in a model home in the new town, returns to many comic and even farcical elements (and one unbelievable character). Throughout, the drama is a series of short scenes concluding in blackouts, making it feel like a Lifetime movie with the commercials removed. A totally unnecessary set change to a fire escape brought the action to a halt; the scene could easily have been played in the main set of the kitchen. Removing some of the blackouts would definitely result in a smoother production that didn’t yank the audience out of the show on a regular basis.
The cast mostly followed the rhythm of the material, 
starting out with rather broad caricatures and slowly shifting to deeper interpretations as the show proceeded. Jackie Kusher brought authority to the patriarch of the family, Harry Simms, and seemed unafraid of laying out the dark and dangerous part of his role. The character started out as a seemingly bombastic nice guy, but quickly was exposed as a creepy violent bigot who manipulates all the members of his family. His wife Gladys, played by actress and New York cabaret star Andrea Bell Wolff, is introduced as slightly weird and not too bright, but as things progress the audience discovers she is a strong match for her husband with her own scores to settle. It’s a fine performance of a personality that is as easy to fear as it is to like.
In the next generation, the real life married team of Holly O’Brien and Mike Roche play Eleanor, the daughter of Harry and Gladys, a determined daddy’s girl with a highly 
nervous personality that colors her days. O’Brien chooses to underplay the later part which might make her performance more compelling. Roche’s Sammy is a nice guy overwhelmed by his father-in-law. His is one of the most interesting characters, and performances, as we watch him grow a backbone during the course of the story.
The most surprising performance of the evening is Spencer Neumann as Elliot, Eleanor and Harry’s unhappy teenage son. A truly eccentric character, whose only ambition is to become a sport’s announcer, and who often narrates his life as it’s happening, utilizing a wooden microphone he made in shop class. The fact that Neumann is making his off-Broadway debut in this production makes his careful and complete development of the character even more impressive. The sixth member of the ensemble is Marina Chan, playing a real 
estate agent desperate for her first sale. Chan does her best to play this impossibly upbeat, vapid always-smiling young woman who disturbingly seems set on a romance with a teenager, but the role eventually defeats her.
Director Bernice Garfield-Szita did what she could to keep the action moving forward and the actors on target, but the flaws in the script somewhat defeated her. The set design by her and Bob Szita created a very cramped situation in the first act, well-detailed but perhaps too realistic for its own good. The model home of the second act seems to allow the actors, and the play, to breath more. She was also responsible for the low-key but character-appropriate costumes.
A Tomato Can’t Grow in the Bronx is far from a bad show. The material certainly tells an interesting story with some intriguing characters. Perhaps one more trip through the playwright’s computer will create a smoother and more compelling version of the tale.
The play runs through December 17 at the Chain Theater, 312 36th St., NYC. For more information and tickets, visit https://atomatocantgrowinthebronx.brownpapertickets.com.
Photos by Mateo Del Campo
