X-Man Returns From LA
John Shea, a distinguished actor who enjoyed both popular and critical acclaim for his role as Lex Luther in the television series Lois & Clark with Dean Cain and Terry Hatcher, is returning to New York and to the stage. He is starring in the new off-Broadway play, The Secret of Mme. Bonnard's Bath. It is in previews now and opens Feb. 8 at the Kirk Theatre (410 West 42nd).
After 25 years in Manhattan, Shea left six years ago to star in a series called Mutant X for the WB, now the CW network. It proved to be a success and was co-produced by Marvel Comics because it was based on their X-Men comic book series.
Shea played the scientist, Adam Kane, who created the mutants and, like the Patrick Stewart character in the movie version, led a small group of them underground in their heroic vigilante action adventures.
Shea said, after many years working off-Broadway, Mutant X was a welcome return to mainstream entertainment. The series played in 120 counties around the world and Shea was nominated for a Genie Award (a Canadian Emmy) for Best Actor. In the last few years, Shea said he, his wife, and two children moved to Los Angeles to see if they wanted to relocate there. They rented an apartment on the beach in Santa Monica and he reconnected with everyone he'd worked with in the film industry.
But, the more time his family spent in Los Angeles, the more they missed New York. Shea was writing a screenplay based in New York, a film that he wanted to shoot here and so this fall they decided the time was right to move back.
One Tub, 300 Paintings
Back in the City only a few weeks later, Shea ran into the playwright Israel Horovitz at an Off-Off-Broadway opening. Shea said they were old friends but hadn't seen each other in many years.
Shea read Horovitz's new play and connected to it immediately. The play deals with the life and loves of the great French painter Pierre Bonnard and asks the question: why did he paint his wife 300 times in the bath? The answer is surprising and a romantic mystery unfolds. In the serendipitous way that art imitates life, it's worth noting that Shea met his wife, the artist Melissa MacLeod, years ago at an art opening when he bought a painting of hers, depicting a partially dressed woman floating in a bathtub.
Shea, who was married at the time, was immediately drawn to its eerie power and hung it in his loft in New York. The painting remained there until he re-met the artist years later, after his divorce. Shea said that when he read Horovitz's play about a painter who painted women in bathtubs, bells went off, and his inner voice spoke: "Pay attention, it said, the hand of fate may be at work here." He said, "I felt like I had to do the play, that it was time to return to my roots in the New York theatre." There are only three actors in it; Shea plays Bonnard at many ages while the other actors play all the other characters in his life, his wife, models, fellow artists, art dealer, and friends.
It is very theatrical, both funny and moving. Horvitz is also directing, and the production is a feast of colors, period costumes, music, and projections all interwoven to tell the story.
Friar Fights for Prostitutes
Shea is also ready to return to his directing roots. He reports, "I've have just finished work on a screenplay called The Junkie Priest, a film inspired by the life of Daniel Egan, a Franciscan friar who worked with prostitutes on the streets of New York in the early 60s and who battled the mob, the city, and the church to save them." Shea met Father Egan in Greenwich Village in 1990 and began interviewing him about his life and work.
"When I moved to LA in the early 90s I started to write a screenplay and after many interruptions for many films, TV projects, and theatre, I have finished."
Filming the movie about the friar is another reason why Shea has decided to move back to New York City.
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