“Mother, I have been seized!” echoed throughout the Huntington Theatre Wednesday evening as Nick Offerman’s character was arrested on stage. John Kennedy Toole’s novel “A Confederacy of Dunces,” adapted for the stage, gave Bostonians a chance to see the “Parks and Recreation” actor take on a new role.
The play throws the audience into the world of New Orleans, where jazz, alcohol, strippers and pornography run amok around the central characters.
Ignatius Reilly (Offerman) set the crowd on fire as a mama’s boy, an over-educated layabout with great pride and ideas about politics and the world. Offerman tickled the audience in a hunting cap, large flannel shirt and lots of padding to get into this character.
Ignatius gets in trouble with the police from the outset, stating, “They tried to arrest me for being interesting.” Ignatius and his frazzled and eccentric mother (Anita Gillette of NBC’s “30 Rock”) find themselves in a car accident.
Their accident results in more police attention, along with a debt to pay for the damages. The arc of the play is thus laid out — where will this old woman and her unemployed 30-year-old son find the funds to get out of this mess? Will they avoid financial doom?
Offerman is best known for his role as the stoic and deadpan libertarian Ron Swanson in the NBC sitcom “Parks and Recreation.” Swanson’s finesse for woodwork and avoiding human contact are part of his mustachioed charm, as his tough, masculine exterior disguises his good heart and fatherly affections.
He gave such a dedicated performance as the government-hating director of Pawnee’s Parks and Recreation department that it’s hard to separate the man from the character. It’s often a risky move for actors to try and branch out from their defining roles.
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However, Offerman switches smoothly from the strong paternal leader to the sniveling and reliant man-child Ignatius.
For Ignatius to fix his financial problems, he must finally find employment after spending eight years in college collecting degrees. Ignatius has the intelligence, but not the drive, to become a cog in the capitalist work force. He finds a number of humorous jobs, including working at a pants store and selling hot dogs as the “purveyor of pork products.”
Throughout his time in the work force, Ignatius upholds Offerman’s former role as a libertarian. He has grand ideas of overthrowing the owners of the pants factory by whipping up organized demonstrations, as well as inspiring world peace and freedom through a sexual revolution.
Politics is a main ingredient in this play, and Offerman is the master of delivering political humor.
The crux of the play comes in the form of fear that Ignatius is paralyzed by — all the education in the world can’t get him to leave his mother’s house or New Orleans. He is also threatened with the fate of being thrown into the asylum for his uselessness.
Ignatius incites Greek mythology by repeatedly cursing Fortuna, the goddess of fate, for spinning her wheel of mayhem. As the play continues, it becomes apparent that it is up to Ignatius to take fate into his own hands.
Offerman took control of his new role, but didn’t stray far from his base knowledge of how delivery can be the key to humor.
Gifted with a scowl of disdain and an imposing mustache, Offerman shows us that the comedy lies in the ridiculous. Leaving that extra second of disgruntled silence before responding to your cast members’ lines allows for the audience to absorb this absurdity. This abyss of the dramatic pause proved as a catalyst for laughter.
Ron Swanson will always be in our hearts, but Nick Offerman has even more to offer us.
