Carol Kane carries the day in Beth Henley's new play Family Week by Sam Whitehead

Forget CDs, DVDs, laser Ds and every other kind of technologically advanced D that's either on the market now or threatening to improve our lives in the near future: I challenge all those electronic wizards and Silicon Valley slickers to conduct a device that can actually pick up the soft-spoken and famously squeaky voice of Carol Kane, 52, and make it comfortably audible. Anyone who feels that that's too easy a challenge, then how about this: Take your supposedly advanced contraption into a swomewhat noisy coffeeshop or restaurant, place it in front of the delightfully idiosyncratic actress, strike up a conversation and see what you record. Pray you have superior hearing ability or you won't detect a peep- guaranteed.
Such was the maddening case the other day when TONY checked in with the diminutive award-winning stage, screen and television star to see how things are shaping up with her latest turn on the boards in Family Week, the new offering from the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Beth Henley (Crimes of the Heart). For the record, my auditory range is legendary. Thank god.
Time Out New York: The first time you collaborated with Henley was in 1996's The Lucky Spot, and since then you've been in three of her other plays. How's experience number five!
Carol Kane: It's been dreadful. No, seriously, I love working witth Beth. At this point, she's an old friend. And I'm delighted to be working with [director] Ulu grosbard, since I'm a longtime fan of his.
TONY: In Family Week, do you play a quirky neurotic?
CK: Well, the family is all in trouble and the mother is in the hospital. Plus, everybody is really dysfunctional in their own way, so I wouldn;t say that I'm particularly quirky and neurotic in this group. I'm just struggling with the past and have high hopes for the future. Is that quirky and neurotic?
TONY: Have you ever played a mean and nasty character? Someone who's really hurtful?
CK: Well, yes. Sometimes those are the roles you run to, if for no other reason than to test yourself, to go there. Also, because those traits are the ones we try the hardest to control in our every day life. Why do you ask the question?
TONY: Because I think most people feel Carol Kane, the actress, to be odd, kind and chirpy...not vicious in any way.
CK: That's funny, I don't feel that's true at all. I might be known for certain things, but I've played crazy, even psychotic, roles on stage, screen and television.
TONY: Which medium do you prefer?
CK: I prefer good writing. I don't really care where it is. I mean, you can find bad writing in a little play or a tiny Off Broadway theater. So I'm open to everything.
TONY: What's the most embarrasing moment you've ever had while working?
CK: When we were doing Dog Day Afternoon, every time Pacino would lock us up in the vault- a real vault- we would all just start hysterically cracking up with nervous laughter. Again and again, it took a long time for us to calm down, and it was terrible for Al, who was being so serious. That was really a shameful and unprofessional thing to do in general.
TONY: What was your first professional experience?
CK: I was 14 and the first play I ever auditioned for was The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie [1968]. I auditioned for it like 80 times, no literally, 13 times- 13 times. And I didn't get it! I think it came down to a conflict between the writer, Jay Presson Allen, and the director, Michael Langham. Eventually, a year later, I ended up in the touring production with Tammy Grimes. And my first film was Carnal Knowledge, another amazing experience, largely because of Mike Nichols, who would tell me you can't do anything wrong because you're doing everything right. The whole cast was incredible, such pros. I was definitely overwhelmed.
TONY: You were lucky on.
CK: Oh, very. In fact, just the other day I was thinking about a few of the amazing people that I've worked wtih, and, being that Family's opening is around the corner. I was also thinking about critics, and consoling myself...I don't know if you want to write this, but you can. I was consoling myself the other day about the fact that I know [New York magazine theater critic] John simon is going to come to this play- and he detests me with a fury that is so fickle and hurtful. The only way I can really get through all that is that I remember him writing horrible things about [some of the great actresses] I've worked with, and I can only think that if this guy is so stupid as to write things like that about them, then I'm in good company. His criticism is always so ugly and personal on such a low lever- like little things about the way people look. I don't understand producers who complain about him and then quote him in ads, because if you're going to believe somebody when they're right, you should believe them when they're wrong.
Family Week is at the Century Theatre [see Off Broadway]. (below)

Family Week- By Beth Henley. Dir. Ulu Grosbard. With Carol Kane and ensemble. Century Center for the Performing Arts (see Off Broadway)

Carol Kane always looks like Wile E. Coyote seconds away from being hit by a falling rock. The superb character actress needs no dialogue to instantly communicate fear and vulnerability. Her messy hair, trembling smile and large, skittish eyes are the absolute picture of anxiety. Best known for her role of Simka on the TV show Taxi (although her scream queen in the terrifying When a Stranger Calls is also an indelible performance), the Beth Henley veteran is an emotionally naked actor who is a perfect fit for the neuroses-drenched Family Week. Perhaps if every part in the generally annoyi8ng comic drama were played by the eccentric Kane, one could imagine this send-up of therapy-culture as being more than intermittingly entertaining. As is, the worry pasted on her face seems to reflect the state of Ulu Grosbard's lifeless, flailing production.
Claire (Angelina Phillips), recovering from the murder of her son, is a patient at the Pastures Recovery Center, where she has been diagnosed with abuse survival, an eating disorder and every other imaginable disease. While she has become an emotional shell of a woman, her visiting family- daughter Kay (Julia Weldon), mother Lena (Rose Gregario) and sister Rickey (Kane)- are equally unstable and abused. The distant Lena was beaten by her parents and teaches her children that "nobody likes a poor person"; the neurotic, leopard-skin-clad Rickey rambles on about how she is "emotionally and spiritually lost"; and the trim Kay is convinced she is fat. Put this dysfunctional family in a loopy, therapeutic setting where you must explore your "primary feelings," which include shame, pain, anger, guilt, fear and loneliness, and you have a pretty dreary 90 minutes.
Beating up on the extreme methods of counseling in treatment centers is not a particularly bold sport. And since Henley never offers a character that is the least bit likable, it's difficult for the audience to be moved by these people's problems. While Kane has some clever line readings, she can't make up for Gregorio's and Phillip's flat performances. By the end of the meandering play, the mother seems to speak for the audience when she demands: Do you have any credentials besides your tragic little lives?" ---Jason Zinoman