There’s a reason sports shows are rare: Not only are they tough to stage, but theater and jocks rarely share the same playing field.
Yet writer Eric Simonson has found a way to pull it off, or at least get produced. With “Bronx Bombers” sliding into home plate, Simonson’s now had three locker-room yarns on Broadway — including 2010’s “Lombardi” (about the Green Bay Packers coach) and 2012’s “Magic/Bird” (about the NBA icons).
In the sports pages, they call that a winning streak.
Despite focusing on three different sports, the shows have a lot in common, namely a preference for the inspirational human-interest stories behind the stats and championships.
At least the two earlier outings vaguely alluded to gray areas.
“Bronx Bombers,” which Simonson also directed, is a shamelessly reverent love letter to the Yankees — or rather the myths the Yankees built around themselves.
The biggest believer is Yogi Berra.
Berra is the heart of “Bombers,” and he embodies team devotion while delivering an avalanche of amusing Yogi-isms — “I may be nostalgic, but I don’t like to live in the past,” and so on.
Unfortunately, he’s played as a doddering holy fool by Peter Scolari (most recently seen as Lena Dunham’s dad on “Girls”). Richard Topol was more effectively sly in the show’s off-Broadway run, back in October.
In the first act, set in 1977, Berra tries to broker peace talks between manager Billy Martin (Keith Nobbs) and right fielder Reggie Jackson (Francois Battiste) in a Boston hotel room. The two brawled in the Fenway Park dugout, and the distraught Berra can’t bear to see his squad divided.
Shortly thereafter, he returns home to his loving wife, Carmen (Tracy Shayne, Scolari’s real-life spouse).
And then Babe Ruth (C.J. Wilson) appears, looking wholly unaffected by his death decades earlier.
Most of the show’s second half consists of a dream in which the Berras hold a dinner party for the Babe and fellow legends Lou Gehrig (John Wernke) and Mickey Mantle (Bill Dawes).
The first African-American Yankee, Elston Howard (Battiste again), is there, too. Even snooty Joe DiMaggio (Chris Henry Coffey) turns up, while Derek Jeter (Christopher Jackson) represents for the younger generation.
The point seems to be that Yankee greatness bridges generations, and that petty rivalries should be snuffed out for the organization’s greater good.
What’s more amazing than dead players chatting over hors d’oeuvres is that a show about a team with such a backlog of personalities, controversies and scandals could be so dull. No George Steinbrenner, no Red Sox, no juicing — no drama.
At this point, you have to wonder what’s next for Simonson. A play about hockey in which the Care Bear players hug?