Excerpt from "Short
Takes"
(New York Times Theater Review of "Marathon '86'", June 3, 1986)
by D.J.R Bruckner
"Little Feet" by Shel Silverstein is smart, mischievous and very quick. Margaret joins Kenneth at a
restaurant, where he has almost finished eating. They are either married or an item and it turns out
that there is a history of his persuading her to acquire kinky tastes, for the sake of sophistication. As
Margaret explains hilariously how her passion for reggae kept her on the dance floor and made her
late to dinner , she notices a scrap of his dinner, "a tiny little foot", on Kenneth's lip and thereby lies
Mr. Silverstein's tale. What is really happening has nothing to do with eating and the lines would craze
an analyst searching for a recognizable displacement. The game is up from the moment Margaret
speculates that Kenneth's crowd has been enjoying its peculiar menu for years "and laughing behind
my back. The minute I'm gone do they say, ‘O.K., the square is gone, bring out the feet?'" Christine
Baranski, wide-eyed and emotionally wide open, and Harris Yulin, with as sly a straight face as one
could imagine, play this little number with the smooth precision of a minuet.
(editor's note: "Little Feet" was also listed as part of the "Marathon '84" series. However, it may have been pulled or rejected at the last minute.)
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