SHINING HOURS.(Shining City)(Theater review)

Of the many images that the prolific actor and director Charles Laughton left behind in his relatively brief lifetime--production stills, head shots, off-the-cuff newspaper photographs--the most effective are Carl Van Vechten's 1940 portraits of the artist. Although he is out of costume and out of character, the Yorkshire-born star brings to these photographs something of his signature role, as Quasimodo in the heart-wrenching 1939 film "The Hunchback of Notre Dame." In Van Vechten's artful, awkward images, Laughton seems uncomfortable in his body, a soft mound of clay; leaning forward, he does not know what to do with his hands, his mouth. He peers at the photographer's lens with a degree of panic, as though pleading for a character to hide behind. Like many great actors, Laughton was well aware that playing a part--inhabiting someone else's drama--gave him the extra layer of skin he needed in order to express himself.

The Canadian-born actor Oliver Platt has a way of moving through space--tentatively, suspiciously, delicately--that recalls Laughton's haunted presence. At forty-six, Platt, who is currently a cast member on the television comedy "Huff," among other things, looks like an overgrown version of the boy who is picked on in the school yard for his pudginess, his conspicuous height, and his sad pudding of a face. In movie roles from the smarmy press attache in Warren Beatty's underrated 1998 political comedy "Bulworth" to the conscience-stricken villain in Eric Blakeney's "Gun Shy" (2000), Platt has charmed with all the unspoken tension of a child trying desperately not to be bullied. Among Hollywood's many bland faces and muscled bodies, he sticks out like a bemused sore thumb.

What a pleasure, then, it is to see Platt in the flesh. Making his Broadway debut as the grieving widower, John, in the Irish playwright Conor McPherson's "Shining City" (a Manhattan Theatre Club production at the Biltmore), Platt talks a blue streak. John has come to a priest turned therapist named Ian (Brian F. O'Byrne), who he hopes will help him cope with his guilt and anguish over the recent loss of his wife. In a blue hooded poncho, John arrives at Ian's nondescript Dublin office and temporary living space--Ian has just left his girlfriend--with the shyness and bravado of a single man on a first date. He does not know how to expose himself to Ian; yet he wants to do nothing but. Taking a seat in the office, John brings his right hand to his mouth as he describes his wife's death in a car accident; his knees tremble as he relays his sudden loneliness. He hesitates before explaining to Ian that he feels he is living with a ghost. Is he mad? What will become of him? The scene goes black. We're left with more questions than clues.

The lights come up next on Ian and his girlfriend, Neasa (Martha Plimpton). Stripped of his professional role, Ian is as articulate as a bungling, confused, unengaged boyfriend can be. Neasa is impatient with the road that he has chosen--to move forward alone. What about their child? she asks. Their domestic partnership? But Ian himself can barely make sense of his motives. He cannot move toward Neasa to comfort her, nor can he look away from the grief he has caused. Blackout again.

"Shining City" is a play about listening--one of the hardest activities for an actor to perform without calling attention to himself. While both Platt and Plimpton are excellent in their roles--and they do nicely with their respective working-class and lower-middle-class Irish accents, too--it's O'Byrne who has the hardest job technically: he must hold up a mirror to two confused souls without conveying his own character's confusion in their presence. In fact, we see little of his confusion until the end of this quick, ninety-minute play. (Ian's dilemma appears, finally, in the form of a beautiful street ...