For the remainder of the year, my San Jose and Peninsula theater reviews will be posted on Talkin’ Broadway with only introductions to those reviews on this site]. Please continue to https://www.talkinbroadway.com/page/regional/sanjose/sj298.html for full review.

“Faster than a speeding bullet” (appropriated), artificial intelligence went from casual coffee klatsch conversation to existential board room challenge.  “More powerful than a locomotive” (appropriated), AI disrupts economic life and eliminates jobs – manufacturing products, interacting with customers over the Internet, identifying criminals, and much more.  In the world of creative entertainment, AI produces lifelike visual images and writes literature in whatever context or style specified.  Relevant to this story, it can also dissect existing literature and identify what sources were used in its composition.

It is in conjunction with the latter that we meet Jacob McNeal (Johnny Moreno).  He is under care for stage 3 liver failure exacerbated by heavy drinking (stage 4 is irreversible) but learns that he has just won the Nobel Prize for Literature.  Will this give him something to live for?

Much like a contemporary take on Fellini’s 8 ½, the protagonist engages with the women in his life in scenes that are dyads of him and his antagonists – a physician, insistent and demanding that he change his ways or begin a death spiral (Abigail Esfira Campbell); his literary agent, loyal but resentful of his disloyalty (Nicole Tung); an interviewing journalist, offended by his racist DEI comments and knowledgeable of his misdeeds but still admiring (Storm White); and his former lover, fiery, hurt, but still connected (Bridgette Loriaux).

The narrative is totally about the title character, and the indomitable Johnny Moreno gives a tour de force performance as is his way.  His irascible, self-indulgent McNeal schlumps about the stage in oversized garments, not caring about appearance.  He wobbles side-to-side, arms with loose and broad gesticulation as he pontificates, often denigrating those he considers undeserving.  And from his well-articulated mouth and with his derisive, incisive speaking style it almost seems that he is literally chewing the scenery……  

McNeal runs through October 19, 2025, at San Jose Stage, 490 South 1^st Street, San Jose, CA.  For tickets and information please visit https://www.thestage.org/.