‘McNeal’ Broadway Review: Robert Downey Jr. Almost Survives His Big Debut

Maybe you’ve had this experience. You follow a reporter’s work in a magazine or newspaper and are impressed by his or her articles. Then this writer covers a subject that you know something about, and he or she gets it completely wrong.

That’s how I felt watching Ayad Akhtar’s new play “McNeal,” which had its world premiere Monday at LCT’s Vivian Beaumont Theater. I much admire the playwright’s previous plays “The Invisible Hand” and “Disgraced,” which won the Pulitzer Prize in 2013.