[In the following review, originally published in Daily News on June 5, 1987, Watt argues that “the oddly interesting thing about Talk Radio is that Barry Champlain isn't much of an exaggeration.”]

Talk Radio at the Public is a hypnotic play about a late-night talk show presided over by an abrasive, egomaniacal, intransigent host who takes phone calls from the flotsam and jetsam of a big city, in this instance Cleveland. Barry Champlain, played by the playwright himself, Eric Bogosian, admonishes, insults, or cuts off his string of callers from his advantageous position at the phone switch.

The play is set in a studio occupied principally by Barry and his engineer, the latter, a one-time would-be radio host who has followed Champlain to Cleveland from Akron and will undoubtedly tag along when the show goes network, which is about to happen unless the host exceeds the limits of bad taste. Barry is also under the watchful eye of his producer （Mark Metcalf） who keeps popping in. And there's a funny double-talking investment counselor （Zach Grenier） who precedes Barry on the air, as well as a fetching blond gofer （Robyn Peterson）. The producer and technician have explanatory monologues during “station breaks” in this 90-minute work, and both think Barry may have blown it when he scoffs at the caller who says his girlfriend has just overdosed and is turning blue. Barry calls him a liar, and sure enough, the caller shows up at the studio giggling at his idiotic joke.

Only at the end of the night's show, when he sits thinking things over while the technician tells him it's dead air with 45 seconds to go, does Barry reveal an inner self of concern and self-doubt. But he shakes it off to leave the studio for another day （he's a loner, we learn） and gird for a new round of vituperation.

Bogosian is superb and frighteningly real, but the oddly interesting thing about Talk Radio is that Barry Champlain isn't much of an exaggeration.