What is efficiency? A.) Having a small apartment. B.) Drinking beer and using the urinal at the same time. If you answered "A", you are a woman. If you answered "B", you are definitely a man.
These are examples of the unavoidable genetic differences between men and women, as showcased in Robert Dubac's The Male Intellect: An Oxymoron? Although this is familiar territory -- Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus -- Dubac takes a more poignant look at the modern mating game. While attempting to answer the question "What do women want?" Dubac makes sure neither sex is left unscathed by his analysis.
The play opens with Bobby (Miles Stroth), a befuddled everyman, trying to figure out what went wrong in his relationship as he waits for his girlfriend to call. The set imitates his brain; the left (masculine) side is cluttered with everything he doesn't need, while the right (feminine) side is empty save for a curtain and a blank chalkboard. The only thing he knows for sure about women is that they are female. Everything else he has learned from other, equally ignorant men: five chauvinists who haunt him in succession.
The Colonel, a Kilgore-esque figure who strategizes how to battle the female race, advises Bobby to tell women up front that he's an asshole. This, in his opinion, is what women want: honesty. Jean-Michel is a foreign exchange student studying philosophy and muses over "abstract fatalism." Even though he himself speaks mostly French, he still thinks that communication is key to relationships. The third chauvinist, Fast Eddie, forms an analogy between women and cars: the goal is to trade up to BBD (Bigger, Better Deals). He believes in passion, saying, "give 'em what they want and introduce 'em to the sidewalk." Old Mr. Linger appears next, a 132-year-old geezer who has been literally fishing for the perfect woman all his life; although he has a sense of humor, he dies without finding his mermaid. Lastly, Ronnie Cabrezzi, a Bronx native, adds sensitivity to the list of things women want. He wonders why his girlfriend is allowed to say, "Fuck you, you fucking fuck," when angry, but still tells him he swears too much.
This one-man show is witty and hilarious, largely because the depictions of men and women are so true. For example, women don't lie, they change their minds. And there is a list of certain things that cannot be erased from men's genetic encoding: "farts in church, can't shop, swears too much, has penis and lies." Bobby justifies: "penises make men swear, especially when we can't use the fucking thing."
Stroth does an exceptional job of portraying all six different characters. He works off the audience's energy and creates a relaxing atmosphere with his conversational tone. The guys' locker room type of humor could definitely appeal to college boys, but as we've discovered, girls in the audience laughed even more than the men did. Especially because we're still left asking: Is male intellect an oxymoron? Or is it female logic? And what do women really want?
