What if Marlon Brando had starred in Citizen Kane? That seems to be the question at the center of Asociación Señor Serrano’s energetic multimedia show Brickman Brando Bubble Boom. The inventive Spanish troupe has Marlon Brando (through clips of his films of course) play John Brickman, a fictitious Englishman who goes from a career as an arsonist, to becoming a millionaire after setting up a vicious cycle of affordable housing and mortgages in Victorian times. The parallels to Orson Welles’ Charles Foster Kane are undeniable, as Brickman seems to be made up of many real life figures, all of whom ended surrounded by wealth, if not emotional contentment.

As they tell Brickman’s story, they also offer a glimpse into Brando’s own biography, from his humble, bratty beginnings in Omaha, to his tragic life’s ending in Michael Jackson’s Neverland, highlighting the irony of how, like the man he is playing, Brando too never found a place to call home. Added to this, they chronicle the Spanish recession, which led to hundreds of thousands of people being evicted from their homes starting in 2008. The troupe uses miniatures, projections, ukuleles and many other elements to tell the three stories, but while their heart is in the right place, the show’s structure can’t help but feel completely arbitrary. Why Brando? Why not use a real life character instead of Brickman? Why not just focus on the Spanish recession?

Brickman Brando Bubble Boom feels unfocused where it should have been flawlessly built. The ideas behind it are admirable, but it feels unfinished, as if its creators were more impressed by the coolness of the concept than the repercussions of its execution. At times it seems as if all they’re trying to do is exhaust you with their restlessness, which makes the one hour long show feel like a marathon session of denial through intentional obliviousness. It satisfies itself with being a wild one, when it really, should have been a contender.