Dancing Like the Stars

Reel to Real -- Playhouse on Park -- Through April 7

All photos by Rich Wagner

The choreographer Merce Cunningham once said, “You have to love dancing to stick to it. It gives you nothing back, no manuscripts to store away, no paintings to show on walls and maybe hang in museums, no poems to be printed and sold, nothing but that single fleeting moment when you feel alive.” The truth of that statement, especially the feeling “alive” part, can be confirmed by traveling to West Hartford’s Playhouse on Park to view its current production of Reel to Real, an offering by stop/time Dance Theater, PoP’s resident dance company, that captures visually the definition of “exuberance.” If you’re feeling a bit down or out of sorts I suggest you hasten up to PoP, buy a ticket and feel your spirits rise and the “Blue Meanies” run for cover (or perhaps start dancing)

So, who will you see on the stage? Well, there’s a speech-language pathologist, several teachers, an administrative assistant at a plastics company, a medical assistant, a volunteer for Dog Star Rescue, a project manager for The Hartford, a physical therapist, a director at an IT consulting company and a dentist (really!). What do they all have in common? Well, obviously, a passion for dance as well as the fact that most of them have been dancing since they were tykes.

As directed and choreographed by Darlene Zoller, who is also the co-founder and co-artistic director at the Playhouse, Reel to Real’s premise is that a man gets locked in a movie theater and, a la Woody Allen’s The Purple Rose of Cairo, screen characters come to life. That’s about it in terms of plot, but plot is not really that important, it’s just the premise that allows Zoller to create some wonderful moments on PoP’s intimate thrust stage.

The show opens with a number from Chicago – “Mr. Cellophane” – that Rick Fountain nails. The musical will be revisited later on during the evening with an entrancing performance of the “Cell Block Tango” and, much to Zoller’s credit, this is not a slavish rehash of Bob Fosse’s choreography. As she commented after the show: “We did our own thing.”

This tour of music and dance numbers from the silver screen gets one’s mind a-working, and if you don’t peek at the program you start thinking: “I wonder if they’ll do…” Well, they can’t do everything (alas, there’s no Fred and Ginger dancing in the dark), but they do hit a lot of high spots, including “When You’re Good to Mamma,” from the aforementioned Chicago, which the talented Amanda Forker belts out with appropriate brio.

Then, from Singin’ in the Rain, there’s the witty “Moses Supposes,” featuring Fountain, Forker and Meredith Longo. Six dancers do a rendition of “Somewhere in the Night” from La La Land, there’s a nod to Mary Poppins (“Step in Time”), and the whole shebang wraps up with two numbers from The Greatest Showman, although I must admit that I wished they had taken on “Come Alive” from that film, but no one asked for my opinion when the show was being put together.

If there’s one false note in the show, it’s the closing number for the first act, which is a “Disco Star Wars” piece that seems to go on forever and not have a clear, conceptual focus. However, one quickly gets over this, for the evening is filled with number and after number that seems to shimmer and shine, no more so than when the entire ensemble is on stage. Whether it’s “Good Morning Baltimore” from Hairspray, “Rhythm of the Night,” featured in Moulin Rouge, or a sensuous take on the “Bohemian Dance” from Funny Face (during which, thanks to the number's principal dancer Alicia Voukides, you’d swear Audrey Hepburn has come back to life), there will be moments that evoke some very fond movie-going memories, and even if you’re not familiar with all of the films referenced, you can’t help but be swept up by the cast’s enthusiasm and talent. By day, they may be teachers, admin and medical assistants, a dentist and an IT consultant, but by night they are dancers, and although it may not pay the rent, it’s obvious that dancing and performing brings joy and passion to their lives, and that joy and passion is lovingly offered to the audience.

This is a show that can’t help but make you smile and perhaps tap your toes, one that might even evoke the thought: “You know, I’d like to see that again.” It runs through April 7. For tickets or more information call 860-523-5900, X10, or go to www.playhouseonpark.org

Lies? Maybe

"Clever Little Lies" -- Square One Theatre Company -- Through March 17

Peter Wood and Paulo Araujo

                In the theater, size really doesn’t matter. You can have the biggest, most lavish venue and a budget that Croesus would envy and still board a clunker (certain recent productions come to mind, but I shan’t mention them). Then you can have a tight budget and a playing space in which you aren’t sure you can safely swing a cat and still produce an engaging, delightful (and thoughtful) evening of theater that satisfies on multiple levels. Such is the case with Square One’s production of Joe DiPietro’s “Clever Little Lies,” directed by Tom Holehan. Nested in the Stratford Academy, this black box theater, if nothing else, points out how nuance and small gestures, easily seen and appreciated by an audience that is just feet away from the performers, allow actors to ply their craft without having to play to the back row.

                The play is essentially a domestic comedy that is driven by infidelity, real or possibly imagined. It all begins when Bill, Sr. (Peter Wood) has just bested his son, Billy (Paulo Araujo) in a tennis game and they are cooling off and changing their clothes in the locker room. Bill senses that something is bothering his son, so he presses and Billy finally breaks down and says he is having an affair with Jasmine, a 20-year-old trainer at his gym. She is, despite the fact Billy is married to Jane (Josie Kulp) and they have a three-month-old daughter, the light of his life, especially when it comes to sex. Bill is, quietly, nonplussed, but he promises he will not mention any of this to Alice (the marvelous Peggy Nelson), Bill’s wife and Billy’s mother. Well, that doesn’t work out very well because in DiPietro’s world. women just know.

 

Josie Kulp and Peggy Nelson

 

                What follows is a delightful cat and mouse game that involves Billy and Jane being invited over by Alice for some cheese cake and talk about “this and that.” Here witty dialogue and some superb acting take over as the two couples deal with innuendo and, perhaps, an affair that Alice had decades ago.

                One of the things that is so enjoyable about this production, as alluded to above, is that the actors can telegraph emotions, often quite humorously, without having to beat drums or prance and pander to the audience. Cases in point: Kulp expresses volumes just by widening her eyes, tensing her shoulders and pursing her lips; Wood uses silence and a thousand-yard stare to emphasize his confliction; Araujo seems to bulk-up as he tries to defend his affair (after all, Jasmine is a trainer) and Nelson, well, she just owns the stage as she confesses (is it a confession?) to an affair.  I’d be happy to bring undergraduate drama students to this production just to have them take note of how Nelson uses her hands.

                I’ve been bored, often yawning and contemplating sneaking out at intermission, while attending some recent “big theater” productions, but there was never a moment when I wanted to leave the confines of Square One. Holehan seems to have a knack for selecting plays that focus on the nature of intimacy, the little things that, in the end, mean so much. He also has the luxury of drawing on a talent pool (Araujo and Kulp are new to Square One) that is professionally outstanding.

                Yes, Square One has, at times, stumbled a bit over its 29 years – what theater company hasn’t? Yet, since I’ve been attending the performances for over ten years, I have been consistently impressed by the quality of the acting and the sensitivity of the direction. This is a small theater with a big heart, and ”Clever Little Lies” will make you smile, at times guffaw, and as you’re driving home, make you think…and ponder the possibilities. You can’t ask more of theater than that.

                “Clever Little Lies” runs through March 17. For tickets or more information call 203-375-8778 or go to www.squareonetheatre.com.

                 

Detroit '67...and so?

Detroit '67 -- Hartford Stage -- Through March 10

                Sometimes you can try too hard to make people care, to tell them “This is important – this is vital.” Such is the case with Dominique Morisseau’s Detroit ’67, which recently opened at Hartford Stage. The play focuses on a black family living in Detroit during the 1967 race riots, and it should be compelling, but it isn’t. The playwright works very hard to draw in the audience, to make those staring up at Riccardo Hernandez’s single set care about the characters, but, by and large, given the structure of the play, the audience remains aloof. Quite simply, you want to care, to be involved, but there’s not that much to care about.

                If you ever took Drama 101 in college, one of the first things you learned was that, for a play to work, there has to be conflict. That is, one character wants something and another character is set on thwarting him or her from achieving the goal. So, is there such conflict in Detroit ’67? Yes, of a sort, for you see, Lank (Johnny Ramey) wants to use inherited money to buy a bar, while his sister, Chelle (Myxolydia Tyler), opposes the idea. She wants to keep things safe, the way they have always been – hence her use of a phonograph to play scratched 45 rpm records. Lank wants to move forward, which is why he and his friend, Sly (Will Cobbs) bring a rather bulky 8-track tape player into the house. It takes a good deal of time to establish this (the production runs over two hours) and, to be honest, it really doesn’t generate much tension. Morisseau, perhaps realizing this, introduces a new character, and it is here that the play goes slightly off the rails.

                Mid-way through the first act, the door to the cellar opens and down the steps come Sly and Lank carrying a body. It’s Caroline (Ginna Le Vine), a white woman. They place the comatose body on the couch. Soon Chelle appears and asks the rather obvious question: “What the hell is she doing here?” The audience might well ask the same question. We learn, eventually, that Caroline, a “waitress” at a strip club, had been assaulted by her boyfriend, a cop, and wandering on the street in a daze, she was seen by Lank and Sly, and Lank, being the good Samaritan that he is, bundled her into their truck and brought her home. Really?

                So, Caroline eventually regains consciousness and reveals that she has no place to go, so Lank, obviously smitten by this white woman, suggests that she stay with his family for a while. Chelle initially objects, but finally suggests that if Caroline is to stay she needs to work, for the brother and sister run a sort-of after-hours club in their basement. Caroline agrees (Really??) and is thus charged with putting potato chips into bowls and doing other menial tasks (there’s a message here, but I’m not sure what it is).

                Le Vine’s character is initially dazed by her boyfriend’s assault. The daze wears off, but not the sense of “What the hell am I doing here in this play?” Le Vine, given the character she is asked to portray, seems at sea most of the time, dutifully delivering her lines but unsure of what her character is contributing to the thrust of the play. Not her fault. The fault lies in the fact that, I suspect, Morriseau is also unsure why she has created this character, or what Bunny (Nyahale Allie), a family friend, is also supposed to be contributing to the play.

                Then there are the race riots, which brought Federal troops and tanks to the city, their presence captured by Nicole Pearce’s lighting and Karin Graybash’s sound. Buildings are being burned, people are being shot and, yes, it affects the family we have been with, but it, oddly enough, seems somewhat beside the point. It’s not that these were not horrific times and that racial tensions didn’t came to a boil, but it all seems unrelated to what we’ve been asked to pay attention to, the disconnect being exacerbated by Caroline’s running in and out – a comely white woman can go wherever she wants in a black neighborhood during a race riot? I mean, again, really?

                The problem with the play is best captured in its final moments, for there has been a loss, a death, that directly affects Chelle, and she grieves, but she is not allowed to grieve alone, for the lighting shifts and there is gunfire and the sound of growling tanks to accentuate her grief. We are asked to understand that the thin stitches that hold our society together are being torn apart but, it’s a theatrical, over-kill moment, manipulative in a most obvious way. Again, we are being instructed to care when the play has done little to make us want relate to these characters. Yes, there’s sound and fury, but what, in the end, does it signify? When, at the end of Driving Miss Daisy, Hoke feeds Daisy a piece of pie, our heart breaks and what the play has been about is confirmed. When Chelle grieves, we’re not sure what we should feel except, perhaps, relief that the play is finally over.

                Detroit ’67 runs through March 10. For tickets or more information call 860-527-5151 or go to www.hartfordstage.org

Present at the Revolution

The Revolutionists -- Playhouse on Park -- Through March 10

Olivia Jampol, Rebecca Hart and Erin Roche
Photos by Meredith Longo

“What’s playing at Hartford Stage?’
“(Insert here the name of a favorite play or musical you’ve probably seen more than once.)”
“Great, I’ll get tickets. How about at Playhouse on Park?”
“Something called ‘The Revolutionists.’”
“Never heard of it.”
“Neither have I.”
“I think we’ll pass.”

This conversation is not surprising, given the need to wisely use limited entertainment dollars. We have a tendency to go with the familiar rather than the unfamiliar, to bet on the tried-and-true rather than the untested. However, in the case of “The Revolutionists,” written by Lauren Gunderson, your decision to eschew an evening at Playhouse because you are unfamiliar with the play would be a big mistake, because “The Revolutionists” is a witty, engaging romp, an exercise into “what if?” history that satisfies on multiple levels and is more than worth the price of admission.

The play takes us to Paris during the height of the Reign of Terror and introduces us to four characters who, in real life, probably never met. First, we meet Olympe De Gouges (Rebecca Hart, who is blessed with a great sense of comedic timing), a frustrated female playwright whose theme song might well be “I Can’t Get Started.” Her only distinction is that she is probably the only female playwright in Paris, and it is for this reason that her door opens and in marches Charlotte Corday (the magnetic Olivia Jampol, who plays Corday as if she is a member of a female rock band and has time-traveled from the 1970s to the late 1700s).

Why has Corday come to see De Gouges? Well, she plans to assassinate Jean-Paul Marat, a man who has sent hundreds of people to meet Madame Guillotine. Corday flashes a knife and demands that De Gouges write an appropriate final line for her, something memorable she can exclaim as she cuts the tyrant’s throat. As would be expected, De Gouges is a bit flummoxed. Her confusion, however, will not end here, for she is about to receive two more visitors.

Jennifer Holcombe and Erin Roche

 

Marianne Angelle (the steady, engaging Erin Roche) is a Caribbean revolutionist who wishes to throw off the yoke of French rule and wants De Gouges to write pamphlets and broadsides in support of her cause. For a writer who is suffering from severe writer’s block, this is becoming a bit more than demanding, but there’s one more person who seeks out De Gouges for her writing ability, and that is, yes, Marie-Antoinette (the marvelous Jennifer Holcombe who, for most of the evening, plays the queen as if she’s just come from playing Miss Adelaide in “Guys and Dolls.”). The queen believes that she has been misunderstood and wishes De Gouges to set the record straight (you see, she never actually said “Let them eat cake,” she was just ordering lunch and, after all, what’s lunch without a piece of cake?)

Thus the stage is set for 90 minutes of rapid-fire dialogue dealing with, among other things, feminism, misogyny, revolutionary zealotry, the theater and the dynamics of play writing. If all of this sounds like heavy baggage, it isn’t, for Gunderson has a marvelous sense of humor and is deft at writing witty repartee while sliding in multiple allusions to contemporary history and theater, all of which director Sarah Hartman is keenly attuned to.

Perhaps you’re thinking, well, this is a period piece so the dialogue will probably be littered with archaic words and made difficult to understand because of out-of-date syntax. Here, again, you would be wrong, for though these are characters who lived in the late 18^th century, their vocabulary and style of conversation is definitely modern, which, in itself, creates much of the humor, for one would not expect, for example, Marie-Antoinette to speak about certain topics in the manner she does.

Gunderson has written what might well be called a verbal carnival that offers something for everyone, and the four superb actors seem determined that you not miss anything. Hart’s portrayal of the somewhat neurotic De Gouges, the first character we meet, establishes the slightly zany, verbal pyrotechnics that will fill the evening. If you weren’t sure that you had entered a Wonderland version of the French Revolution, Corday’s entrance will confirm that we’ve gone down the rabbit hole. With untamed golden locks, Jampol is a self-proclaimed assassin who seems to be on Speed, a whirlwind of emotions whose only wish is become immortal by insuring her place in history.

Of the four characters, Roche’s Marianne Angell seems to be the most stable as she works to help De Gouges overcome her inability to set pen to paper. Yet Roche instills in her character a dignity and dedication to “the cause” that is a nice counterpoint to Corday’s more histrionic approach to combatting tyranny.

Finally, there’s Holcombe’s Marie-Antoinette. The challenge of creating a “ditzy blond (or bewigged)” character is much akin to that of creating a “bad actor” character – there’s always the temptation to take the portrayal just a bit too far, but Holcombe, thanks to the dialogue she’s been given by Gunderson, while prancing and often babbling, allows her character’s innate intelligence to peek through.

To get the full benefit of attending and enjoying “The Revolutionists,” you have to pay close attention, for many of the best lines are, well, one-liners, such as Du Gouges comment to Marianne (who is black) that Thomas Jefferson would appreciate her, or when, near the end of the play, De Gouges envisions writing a musical about the Revolution, she asks, “Do you hear the people sing?” Her idea is rejected out of hand.

So, if you’re deciding how to budget your entertainment funds, give “The Revolutionists” a shot. You won’t begrudge the money spent, because the play is chock-full of verbal goodies and is brought to life by four actors who, each in her own way, beguiles and entrances. Quite simply, this is theater worth seeing.

“The Revolutionists” runs through March 10. For tickets or more information call 860-523-5900, X10, or go to www.playhouseonpark.org

On the Job

Working -- ACT of Connecticut -- Through March 10

The cast of "Working." Photo by Jeff Butcher

In 1974, Studs Terkel published Working, an oral history of working folks talking about their jobs and how they felt about them. In 1977, Stephen Schwartz, he of Pippin and Wicked fame, created a musical loosely based on the book, with four other composers also supplying music and four writers besides Schwartz penning lyrics. The show previewed in Chicago and then opened on Broadway in 1978, running for 24 performances. Since then, the show has been tinkered with and massaged several times, and its latest iteration is now up at ACT of Connecticut in Ridgefield, with director Daniel C. Levine doing additional massaging and tinkering, with songs now coming from six composers including Lin-Manuel Miranda.

The result? Well, if you’re looking for a strong plot-line you’ll be disappointed, for the show is essentially a series of vignettes (most centered on songs, but there are several monologues), but if you just want to be entertained by a stellar cast backed by a four-man orchestra that jumps, jives and pulsates, then Working is the show for you. It is, at moments, bright and bubbly, emotionally moving, and highly perceptive about the working folks who construct buildings, fight fires, serve food, clean homes and offices and tend to the aged, often going about their jobs without really being noticed.

Levine approached Schwartz, who is a Ridgefield resident, with suggestions about how the show might be modified. Schwartz gave the nod, and Levine proceeded to create his own version of Working, primarily by inclusion of video clips and projections – a lot of videos and projections. Some might complain that, in sum, it creates a certain visual overload, but, oddly enough, the effect is that you have been immersed in the Terkel book and in the lives of the people the actors represent, but it also gives the show a very distinct 21^st-century feel, for we have (like it or not) become used to images flashing before our eyes and multiple screens streaming information. Levine has also given a local spin to the production, for as he notes in the Playbill, the show offers insights into “what the waitress at Dimitri’s Diner thinks about,” as well as how the man who trims tree branches away from Main Street’s power lines came to his job or “what the owner of Tony’s Deli dreams about.”

There’s also the fact that the visuals are simply icing on the cake, for the focus remains on the six actors who create multiple characters during the 80-minute run of the show, and they do a hell of a job. You have whores and a grade school teacher, a fireman, a cleaning lady, a waitress, a somewhat addled retired gentleman, a player in the financial market, a housewife and several health care workers. And it all works, primarily because these are not cardboard characters – as the actors appear in different guises their voices change, their body language changes, and the whore magically becomes the cleaning lady.

This is definitely an ensemble effort, but there are moments that seem to glitter more than just shine, and two of them are created by Laura Woyasz, first as the grade school teacher who is bedeviled and confused about how the classroom and the students have changed over the four decades she has been teaching (“Nobody Tells Me How”), and then she reappears as a waitress in “It’s an Art,” in which she leaps, glides and whirls as she serves food and makes nice with customers. Her performances as these two characters, in themselves, are worth the price of admission.

Then there’s Cooper Grodin who plays the nasty finance whiz but reappears later on as the retired man who can barely walk. With a wig (compliments of Liz Printz) and appropriate body language, he becomes a shattered man who struggles to continue to give meaning to his life.

Then there’s Zuri Washington’s turn in “Just a Housewife,” a set-piece that must have resonated with more than a few in the audience. She deftly captures the drudgery and moments of despair that many women – just housewives! – must deal with.

Pointing out these specific performances does not in any way lessen the work of the other actors: Brad Greer, Andre Jordan and Monica Ramirez. Under the deft, creative direction of Levine, they all contribute to what is a tremendously enjoyable evening of musical theater, capped by the show’s final two songs, “If I Could’ve Been,” a heartfelt consideration of what might have been if “life” hadn’t stepped in and demanded that rent be paid and children be fed, and the show’s finale, “Something to Point to,” which emphasizes that people, in their jobs, need to be able to claim that they made a difference, that they helped create something, that they were not just drones eking out a 9-to-5 existence.

The show is a visual whirligig, for the actors are almost in constant motion, the set spins, and the various characters appear and disappear in kaleidoscopic fashion, all of this while projections and video clips (the work of Caite Hevner) propel and punctuate the action. Levine has taken full advantage of the technical resources available to him in this state-of-the-art theater and the result is a carnival of sight and sound, a stroll down a midway where every booth is staffed by working folks offering something intriguing, entertaining, touching and, at moments, entrancing.

Working runs through March 10. For tickets go to actofct.org.

What the Playwright Heard

Good Faith -- Yale Repertory Theatre -- Through February 23

Rob Demery, Laura Heisler, Billy Eugene Jones
and Ian Bedford. Photo by Carol Rosegg

 

                “Good Faith,” a new play that is enjoying its world premiere at Yale Repertory Theatre, is one of those plays that draws the adjective “important” to it like a magnet draws metal filings. Why? Well, it deals with important issues, a whole laundry list of important issues. As a matter of fact, I don’t think playwright Karen Hartman has missed a single contentious topic that bubbles on or beneath the surface of the troubled waters of 21^st-century America. Does this make for an enjoyable or gripping evening of theater? Well, I guess that’s in the eye (or, perhaps more accurately, often the ear) of the beholder.

                As directed by Kenny Leon, this exercise in touching all of the politically correct and incorrect bases was birthed when Yale contacted the playwright and asked her if she would like to write a play about the Ricci v. DeStefano court case that was initiated after 118 New Haven firefighters took a test in 2003 to see who would qualify for promotion to lieutenant.

The results of the test were contested, based on the claim that the test was biased. This led to an investigation by New Haven’s Civil Service Board, which failed to certify the test’s results, which meant all promotions were frozen. Twenty firefighters, primarily white, brought suit on the basis of reverse-discrimination. The case reached all the way to the Supreme Court (2009), which ruled in favor of what had become known as the New Haven Twenty. A subsequent lawsuit was filed by a black fireman, arguing that how the test was constructed and weighted was discriminatory. After a financial settlement was offered to him by the city, the case was dropped. Of course, there’s more, much more, but your eyes are probably already starting to cross (if you want or need clarification – and you may just – read the show’s program).

So, how do your craft a play about all of this? Well, Hartman decided to write a play about how she went about researching to write the play, along the way interviewing many of the key players, these interviews providing the subtitle for the play: “Four Chats About Race and the New Haven Fire Department.” Does it work? Well, yes and no.

The play opens with the Writer (an engaging Laura Heisler) telling a family story and then setting the stage for what follows, which is the appearance of four people she interviewed who were involved in the lawsuits: Frank, a white firefighter (Ian Bedford), two black firefighters, Mike (Billy Eugene Jones) and Tyrone (Rob Demery), and Karen, (Rene Augesen), the attorney for the New Haven Twenty who won the Supreme Court case.

The rest of the two-plus hours consists of some insights into how firefighters are trained plus what the playwright heard and recorded at these interviews in scenes in which the Writer mostly sits quietly listening to what is being said. There’s a lot of contention in these interviews, first between Mike, who is erudite (sometimes making up his own words when real ones won’t suffice) and seems to be a walking encyclopedia of race relations in America over the past three centuries, and Tyrone, who eschews flights of philosophical musings mixed with sociological theory for a more down-to-earth look at race relations.

These two characters have a lot to say…I mean, a lot to say. The problem is, they often talk over each other – not just biting into each other’s lines but talking, often at high volume, at the same time for extended moments. The result is an avalanche of words – you hear the rumble and tumble, but it’s often well-nigh impossible to capture what each character is actually saying. Phrases pop out like stones tossed from the avalanche, but there is little to no coherence when this is going on, and it happens several times. Thus, as with being caught in an avalanche, if you survive you cannot help but feel a bit bruised and broken.

Fortunately (or perhaps unfortunately), the second-act’s extended scene in which the Writer interviews Karen, the lawyer, quickly turns into a monologue in which what the lawyer says is never truly contested…she just gives her views on the case, on sexism, on politics and how it affects the judicial system and, along the way, takes to task Sonia Sotomayor, who ruled against the plaintiffs when the case came before the Second Court of Appeals in 2007. Her ruling later became a topic when Sotomayor was testifying prior to her confirmation for a seat on the Supreme Court. It all comes off as a guest appearance by a well-known lawyer at some high-profile law school’s seminar, with the play’s audience in attendance, whether they wish to be or not.

The most effective of the “chats’ is the final one, when the Writer finally gets Mike and Frank to sit down and talk. It’s effective because the two men, coming at all that has happened from two different perspectives, both make valid points, and although they do interrupt each other, there is none of the double-dialogue that mars the “chats” between Mike and Tyrone. It’s a strong way to end the play and you just wish there had been more of this type of staging (and writing) earlier on.

I may have truly become a citizen of Curmudgeon Land, but after the very engrossing scene between Mike and Frank, the play ends somewhat gratuitously. As flames roar above them, (compliments of projection designer Zachary Borovay), the characters assemble on stage and essentially ask the audience who is there to save them when they are caught in a fire? Well, of course, it’s the firefighters. Well, as true as that is, and with no disrespect to those who risk their lives battling fires, the moment is a manipulative throw-in and has little to do with what the play is essentially about. In essence, it’s a cheap shot to generate a “feel-good” emotion as the audience exits the theater.

The basic problem with “Good Faith” is that the audience is often twice-removed from what occurs on stage due to Hartman’s decision to frame the play in terms of what the playwright saw and heard during her research (and the fact that the Writer is always there, watching). In essence, we are seeing what the Writer saw rather than experiencing the “chats” and inherent confrontations on our own. It’s like Ibsen is a character in “The Doll’s House,” telling us what he saw as he took meticulous notes while observing the goings-on in the Helmer household. Nora does finally slam that door, but Ibsen is there watching.

“Good Faith” runs through February 23. For tickets or more information call 203-432-1234 or go to www.yalerep.org

The Precious Ring

The Engagement Party -- Hartford Stage -- Through February 3

                When Samuel Baum was writing his play, The Engagement Party, I imagine he was fresh from reading Robert Burns’ poem, “To a Mouse.” You know the one – it’s where Burns writes: “The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men / Gang aft agley,.” Or perhaps while he was tapping on his keyboard, Baum was playing Joe South in the background, South singing “The Games People Play” – “Oh the games people play now / Every night and every day now / Never meaning what they say now / Never saying what they mean.” Maybe not, but this tightly-written play about how things can fall apart and the games even best friends play certainly evokes thoughts of both the poem and the song.

                Astutely directed by Darko Tresnjak, with a major assist from scenic designer Alexander Dodge, who deftly utilizes the theater’s turntable stage to reveal various rooms in a Park Avenue apartment, this engaging one-act play perceptively plays with the audience’s emotions: a rise and fall, then another rise and fall, and yet another until we get to the denouement that, though expected, is still satisfying.

                So, what do we have here? Well, it’s an engagement party that Josh (Zach Appelman) and Katherine (Beth Riesgraf) are hosting for Kate’s family and some close friends. There’s some initial couple-nuzzling between the two and some pickle-arranging and then the guests start to arrive.

First are Kate’s parents, Conrad (Richard Bekins) and Gail (Mia Dillon – kudos for her subtle, hush-puppy Southern accent), both of whom are apparently delighted with the pending marriage of their daughter to Josh. The bell rings, the door opens, and Haley (Anne Troup) and her husband Kai (Brian Lee Huynh) stroll in. At this point it becomes obvious what costume designer Joshua Pearson has brought to the party, for while Kate is dressed in a stylish, clinging gown, Haley, her college friend, is wearing drab clothes that seem to want to shun her body.

Another doorbell ding-dong and Alan (Teddy Bergman) appears, appropriately dressed as the professor he is. The group sits down for some social chit-chat, mostly dealing with how Josh and Kate met and whether Josh, jokingly, really deserves Kate. There’s a slight bit of tension when Conrad questions Alan, a sociology professor, about his antagonism to the consumer society, but the pot, right now, is only on a very low simmer.

Anne Troup, Brian Lee Huynh, Richard Bekins, Mia Dillon
Beth Riesgraf, Teddy Bergman and Zach Appelman

A final doorbell, and in bursts Johnny (Brian Patrick Murphy), Josh’s childhood friend who is back from a recent tour in Iraq. He’s loud, profane (his shirt, compliments of Pearson, says it all) and his entrance jerks the audience out of its expositional lethargy. There’s a sense that things are about to happen, and they soon do.

Given the nature of the play, writing about it opens up many spoiler-pitfalls. I will try to skirt them, but it’s impossible not to mention the engagement ring ($300,000 of diamonds) that Josh has given Kate. This is what Hitchcock would call the MacGuffin, the object that has really no true value to the plot but motivates the characters to act in certain ways and pursue certain goals…and in this case, reveal underlying discontents and several dark secrets. What triggers the rising action of the play is the loss of the ring – it disappeared when Kai spilled some wine while at dinner. Where has it gone? Has someone…horrors!...stolen it?

  What follows is the breakdown of friendships as Josh’s suspicions, with underlying motivations that will eventually be revealed, turn from one guest to another. This leads to some intensely emotional confrontations in the living room, the kitchen, and finally a bedroom (as the set turns), all deftly acted out by this superb cast. In the process, the loving, familial, fraternal relationships established in the early exposition are challenged and fractured.

Part of the play’s appeal is that there’s nary a cardboard character on the stage. Baum has peopled his play with flesh-and-blood folks complete with their own fears, desires and ghosts. Thus, as they interact, ostensibly motivated by the ring’s disappearance, the audience is involved. Whether it’s Kai confronting Josh about his suspicions, or Kai challenging Alan about what he has said (or revealed), or Kate confronting Josh about how they met and his true motivations, or a major reveal late in the play that involves Gwen, Conrad, Josh and Kate (the reveal a tad melodramatic; it’s a soap-opera moment but, whatever), it all engages the audience because there have been emotional connections made with these characters.

The danger inherent in plays like The Engagement Party, with its multiple reveals and rising emotions, is that, as things heat up, actors might have a tendency to go over the top. Tresnjak doesn’t allow this to happen. Yes, there’s disillusion and disappointment expressed and voices are raised, but the heightened scenes never become an excuse for the characters to lose their inherent civility. In other words, they tremble on the “eve of destruction” of relationships but pull back from the ultimate abyss – they opt to leave rather than drive a stake into the heart of their relationhips. This makes what has been fractured in the relationships over the course of the evening all the more poignant. Although there are flashes of anger, the operative emotion at the end of the play is sadness and a sense that it all didn’t have to happen, punctuated by a very simple sound, almost inaudible, at the end of the play that is a wonderful theatrical moment.

The pleasure in watching The Engagement Party unfold is that every member of the audience can relate, in one way or another, to what occurs. We have all told “social lies,” we have all become heated and perhaps irritated to the point of mania over something that, in the end, is revealed to be trivial. We have all said things that, with the dawn, we wish we could erase from the tape of life. We have all done things that, over the years, weigh us down, that we form mental scabs over and yet, still, there is pain. The play compresses all of this into one evening’s social gathering that is meant to be joyous and yet becomes a slashing of the fabric that holds us all together.

As I exited the theater, a man in front of me turned to his companion and said. “Wasn’t that a wonderful play?” She nodded and said: “I want to cry for all of them.” Well, yes, you do want to cry for all of the characters because, well, to edit the immortal words of Pogo, “They are us.”

The Engagement Party runs through February 3. For tickets or more information call 860-527-5151 or go to www.hartfordtsage.org.