Pictures From Home

(L-R) Danny Burstein, Zoe Wanamaker, Nathan Lane (Julieta Cervantes, 2023)

(Posted 2/22/23) By Fern Siegel

The veracity of photographs is always debatable. Is the image a true reflection of the subject? Or does subjectivity read meaning into a still image? It is impossible to strip an image of its dual perspective.

That understanding gets clearer — and blurrier — when it involves family photos, a medium that Larry Sultan devoted a decade of his life to curating.

Now on Broadway at Studio 54, Pictures From Home boasts a stellar cast, with Danny Burstein as Sultan and Nathan Lane and Zoe Wanamaker as his exasperated parents. Playwright Sharr White dramatizes Sultan’s exhibition of the same name from 1992, part of a retrospective of his work at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

Although in fairness to Sultan, the tapes, home movies and photos render it more of a touching adaptation — funny and heartbreaking.

Pictures From Home covers multiple themes — from success to aging, parents and children, the reality of long marriages and the art of making art — with genuine feeling.

Larry Sultan’s photo-memoir captures nearly 10 years of parental portraits in Los Angeles, from 1982-1992. There are not only the requisite staged shots, but stills from Super-8 home movies shot decades earlier.

All are projected on the living-room wall, accompanied by commentary from his father Irving (Lane). And the remarks are often priceless. His parents are frustrated by their son’s endless weekend visits. But the real point of contention: His father is unnerved by photos he feels do not truthfully reflect their life.

In fact, it’s Irving’s exasperation that often invokes an earlier play, Death of a Salesman, which also addressed fathers and sons.

Irv is a salesman, a poor man who worked hard and eventually rose to become a vice president at Schick. Though more successful than Willie Loman, the two share key experiences. Their connection is the American quest for financial success. Arthur Miller wrote in Death of a Salesman: “A salesman has got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory.”

Irv’s dream was primal: survival. His success was due to charm, insight and drive. One scene has Irv explaining how to sell, and that brief presentation is mesmerizing.

“Let me tell you a secret about jobs,” Irv tells Larry, whose artistic project aggravates the former executive. “If nobody can fire you from doing something, then it’s not a job.” The comic exasperation is vintage Lane — but under the laugh line is a larger truth.

And in case Larry’s missed his father’s feelings about image vs. reality, he adds: “The image of success, Larry, didn’t buy you every fucking thing you had your entire life. Actual success did.”

The parental tension is acute. And every bit as sharp as the color-drenched photos of Larry’s life.

Yes, there is life beyond the frame, yet within it, the post-war era of American prosperity is captured in sunny California moments. The cost of that prosperity is part of the photo-memoir’s exploration. And that’s where Jean injects her experiences.

Played by Wanamaker with an edgy, insightful sensibility, Jean is acutely aware of what her husband’s work cost their marriage. She’s equally concerned that Larry leaves his own family regularly to visit his parents. Where is his sense of familial responsibility? What is he ultimately searching for?

Similarly, Lane supplies humor, an expressive face and delivers an intense performance. Burstein, the attentive son, navigates between his parents with tenderness, but it’s clear his photo pursuits are also driven by his own psychological needs. 

Sultan searched for answers in visual images, looking for the story behind the photo. A happy face may hide a miserable one seconds later. Conversely, what appears as frustration to one viewer may be seen as worry by the actual subject.  

Pictures From Home raises serious questions, including: Do we see others as they see themselves? Do we see ourselves truthfully? The curation of photos, not unlike the curation of social-network profiles, often dismisses or deletes anything that runs counter to a carefully created script.

To Sultan’s artistic credit, he’s not afraid to delve into unpleasantness or seek answers to uncomfortable questions. Under Bartlett Sher’s sensitive direction, the powerhouse trio provide a compelling, often hypnotic and occasionally discomforting reality. What appears as ordinary photos, in their hands, produces moving theater.