Sam and Amy Hammer are a middle-aged couple with a sumptuous home on Chelsea's so-called "Millionaire's Row." He runs a successful department store; she's a lovely hostess and housewife. They've just rung in 1929. What could possibly bring the Hammers down?
It's not the impending stock-market crash, as you might suspect at the top of The House in Town, Richard Greenberg's grim, stately, quietly devastating new play. In its 90-plus minutes, it traces the Hammers' own private crash and great depression, which has less to do with economics than with the ravages of age, duplicity and compromise—the usual playwrights' grist, in other words. If there's a faint sense of the routine about the way Greenberg takes apart this glittering, pointedly childless couple, Doug Hughes' smartly shaped direction nevertheless gives the play's revelations a sharply studded rhythm.
 

And the cast is excellent, headed by Jessica Hecht and Mark Harelik as the attractive but hopeless central couple. Hecht in particular has been handed a showpiece role with a swooping, tragic arc, and she masters it rivetingly: Amy is a sensitive, smiling gamine with an unwise dependence on the kindness of the strangers she thinks of as her friends and family. Hecht, her hair piled on her head and her native softness augmented by a brittle edge, registers Amy's slow-blooming horror with wrenching force.
Sam, meanwhile, is the sort of stern, hemmed-in businessman who keeps his suit and tie on till bedtime; he may privately pine for the "glorious swirl" of the city, as he tells a callow young clerk he's taken under his wing (Dan Bittner), but he's a sad, rigid figure prone to long, inscrutable stares into the fireplace. Harelik gives him a stiff-backed gait and an impenetrably lockjawed diction that makes him both formidable and, when push comes to shove, utterly helpless.
Amy's purported friend Jean (Becky Ann Baker) is a gossipy, cynical wiseacre in showy flapper clothes; as Baker plays her, with snappy relish, she's perhaps a touch too mean-spirited for us to believe that Amy would keep on confiding in her, but she does provide the valuable service of regular reality checks on her friend's dreamy delusions. Armand Schultz, as her brusque doctor husband, Con, seems similarly unbuttoned by contrast with the cautious Sam. And as the young clerk who becomes unwittingly tangled in the complications of the Hammers' marriage, Bittner locates the restless, uncomprehending urgency of a character who spends every scene onstage trying to wriggle his way to the exit.

During an uncharacteristically passionate speech to the young man, Sam refers to the "modern age" as a period marked by the "dragging inside of the life of the street," obliterating the distinction between private and public lives. Sam thinks he welcomes this trend, but the production's forbidding design elements let us know it won't be a smooth transition: John Lee Beatty's stark cutaway house set is surrounded by exposed girders; David Van Tieghem's sound design mixes burbling, dissonant chamber music with cold industrial heaves and scrapes; Brian MacDevitt's lighting strikes a balance between warm hearth and hellfire.

That may sound a bit heavyhanded, but it matches Greenberg's thematic ambitions. An expert mixer of light comedy with dark dramatic strains, here he reverses the recipe, edging gingerly into the fraught realm of Strindberg or Ibsen. His climax even explicitly references the painful feminist awakening of A Doll's House. If The House in Town doesn't quite reach those towering heights, Hughes and this expert cast nevertheless give this dark meditation the concentrated emotional punch of a wrecking ball.

VERO BEACH — If dogs could talk back, they'd say exactly what Sylvia does.
"Sylvia," playing now at the Riverside Theatre in Vero Beach, is a well-put-together comedy about the relationship between not only husband and wife, but man and dog.

The show is masterfully crafted, tightly acted and unique from the very first scene, when Greg (Tim Ewing), a 50-something man on the edge of a mid-life crisis, bounds into his New York apartment with his new dog Sylvia, played by Ericka Kreutz.
Kreutz carries the energy and mannerisms of a pooch, but she also walks on two legs, talks and talks back. It's a brilliant concept that never seems out of place, because most of us think of our dogs as people, anyway.

When Sylvia hears the word "out," for instance, she not only starts to run around and get excited. "Did I hear the word 'out'?" she says. "Ooh, I love that word! I love that word out! Let's go out!" and hands her leash to Greg.

Kreutz's antics range from precious to side-splitting and continue for the majority of the show, but "Sylvia" is more than just cute. Over time, the dog drives a big wedge between Greg and his wife, Kate (Barbara McCulloh).

Kate is starting a promising new career, and Greg is growing sick of his. She wants nothing to do with the dog, and he wants to take her with them everywhere they go.

The tension continues to mount until Kate and Sylvia finally come to blows in a scene where McCulloh, in an otherwise thankless role, gets her opportunity to shine.

And shine she does. McCulloh pulls off "slightly tipsy" without overdoing it, and her down-on-the-ground, nose-to-nose grudge match with Kreutz is one of the funniest moments of the entire play.

While the Greg/Kate/Sylvia "love triangle" is the main story, "Sylvia" is punctuated with hilarious performances by Jim VanValen, who plays three very different roles that all steal the show.

He's Tom, the streetwise New York everyman who reads Greg like a book. Then he's Phyllis, a high-society dame to whom Sylvia takes an extra special liking. Finally, he returns as Leslie, a truly strange, androgynous marriage counselor.

VanValen is masterful whether he's wearing a ball cap or a woman's wig and high heels, and his interludes give even more levity to an already very funny show.

Although "Sylvia" revolves around an animal, it won't leave nondog people behind. It may do just the opposite, because the story is so very human.
 
 

I swear it's not just because Barbara McCulloh sat on my lap during her song "Come A-Wandering With Me" that I was infatuated with her performance as three different femme fatales in The High Life at the 45th Street Theatre. In Musicals Tonight!'s pleasant concert presentation of the mild operetta from 1961 (called The Gay Life then and lasting 113 performances on Broadway), McCulloh (a cross between Joan Greenwood and Martha Raye) is a delicious, high-wattage vamp, tucking the evening ever so firmly into her bodice.

Based on Arthur Schnitzler's Anatol, a picaresque tale of a rake's progress through the boudoirs of Vienna, the musical is less witty and erotic than its source. Rather, the adaptation by book writers Michael and Fay Kanin, with music and lyrics by Arthur Schwartz and Howard Dietz, is closer to, and a pale imitation of, Lerner and Loewe's 1958 film Gigi.

The plot is similar: Anatol is tamed by Liesl, a young woman whom he looks upon merely as the younger sister of his best friend, Max. But the realization of his romantic attraction here comes as an afterthought, with the climactic boy-almost-loses-girl moment occurring deep into Act II.

The score has its compensations, with the breakout "Who Can? You Can" and a pair of lilting songs for Liesl, "Magic Moment" and "Something You've Never Had Before." But the lyrics are only competent and the book is humorless.

Director-choreographer Thomas Mills uses the tiny stage to advantage -- it never seems cramped -- and James Stenborg does splendid work as music director, vocal arranger, and lone pianist.

Paul Jason Green is an ingratiating Anatol, with Jenni Barber a silver-voiced Liesl (the Barbara Cook role) and Doug Shapiro a comical Max. Others in the musically accomplished ensemble are Nicolas Dávila, Kyrst Hogan, Dennis Holland, Nehal Joshi, Hannah Knowlton, Meredith Pryce, Roger Rifkin, Reshma Shetty, Deborah Jean Templin, and Matthew Trombetta.

If you were wondering about the relevance of Rodgers and Hammerstein's venerable "The King and I," just look in on the exquisite new Music Circus production that opened Tuesday at the Wells Fargo Pavilion. Director Leland Ball's fine cast doesn't generate the sexual intrigue exhibited in some versions of the classic cultural collision, but there is an elegance and profound emotional depth that provides a fitting climax to the summer season. Ball mainly opts for simple but dramatically staged numbers that emphasize the expository songs and complexly layered relations among characters.
The musical adaptation of Margaret Landon's "Anna and the King of Siam" revolves around the conflict of wills between English schoolteacher Anna Leonowens (Barbara McCulloh) and the Siamese king (William Parry) who has hired her to instruct his children. Set in 1860s Bangkok and first performed on Broadway in 1951, the story prefigures the mainstreaming of women's rights and the often awkward intersecting of Eastern and Western cultures.

McCulloh's Anna possesses an unassailable spirit and refined gentility that defines the production. Revisiting a role she performed on Broadway (in some of the same amazing gowns), McCulloh has a lush voice and regal aura, making her Anna a formidable presence. Parry's potentially domineering King actually has to scrap his way toward equal footing despite an imperial jump-start.

Rodgers and Hammerstein were still riding the popular wave of their previous hit, "South Pacific," when they created the show that became so identified with star Yul Brynner. Clearly unafraid of controversy, the songwriting duo placed a mixed-race pairing between Anna and the King at the forefront of their story. Though feelings between the two are mostly suppressed (adding to the story's seductive appeal), we see them grudgingly gain respect and understanding of each other.

Representing a contrasting version of lovers are Enrique Acevedo's hunky Lun Tha and Diane Veronica Phelan's simmering Tuptim. Lun Tha is an envoy from Burma and Tuptim "the gift" he bears to the King. The pair are not-so-secretly lovers, encouraged by Anna and shielded from the King by his wife, Lady Thiang (the excellent Sandia Ang).

Daring to act on their potentially fatal attraction, the younger pair risk their lives to be together. Phelan's glistening soprano and Acevedo's husky tenor make a convincing romantic pair on the showpiece duets "We Kiss In Shadow" and "I Have Dreamed."

Tuptim's symbolic staging of "Uncle Tom's Cabin" as a defiant allegory of her submission to the King adds to the production's lush presence. In the ballet, renamed "The Small House of Uncle Thomas," Yoko Fumoto radiantly stands in for Tuptim as Eliza, who must flee the evil Simon of Legree (Luis Avila) to be with her lover.

"The King and I" has become a reliable staple of American musical theater and the Music Circus, with this its 12th production. The expansive values in the story and difficult but rewarding journeys of the characters make it still worth telling.

The other day, Leland Ball was standing in the hallway of the Sacramento Ballet building at 16th and K streets. From one side, he could hear 1950s-era rock music from a rehearsal of "Grease." From the other side came a lovely Rodgers and Hammerstein melody from "The King and I." "That's Music Circus," he said. "The gamut of musical theater, from classics to contemporary. It all fits very comfortably."

Ball is directing Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II's "The King and I," which opens Tuesday and is the final production of this year's Music Circus season.

"I think they (California Musical Theatre executive producer Richard Lewis and artistic director Scott Eckern) think of me as the Rodgers and Hammerstein guy," Ball said during a break in rehearsals. "I did 'Oklahoma' last summer and that went very well. I've done 'Carousel,' 'The Sound of Music' about a dozen times" - he breaks off his thought for an aside: "You know, Oscar Hammerstein was one of the original investors in the tent in 1951. That's one reason they opened with 'Showboat.' " - and then continues, "and 'The King and I.' It's a true classic. All those shows are so strong."

Ball came to Music Circus full time in 1989 and left - he was producing director at the time - in 2002 to move to New York to be near his daughter and two grandchildren and to Broadway. But he didn't retire.

"My daughter calls retirement the 'R' word, and we don't use that. But the truth is, I'm beginning to start to cut back."

Ball will be 67 in October, but "cutting back" didn't stop him from directing "The Pirates of Penzance" in Pittsburgh in June before returning to Sacramento to help close the third Music Circus season in its new home. He opened the Wells Fargo Pavilion by directing "Cats" in July 2003 and "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" in August of that year. Last year, it was "Oklahoma!"

Ball has spent his entire professional life in the theater and has directed only musicals for the past 22 years.

"I was born to do musicals," he said. "I love American musical theater. The best musicals are American. Americans believe there are happy endings. American philosophy and the musical-theater form just fit together.

"Even though some bad things happen in 'Carousel,' the ending is uplifting. It's the way Americans look at life."

Perhaps not surprisingly, Ball was voted "most optimistic" in his high school class.

"The King and I" was written in 1951 and has been performed countless times. It was last revived on Broadway in 1996.

(Barbara McCulloh, who plays Anna in the Music Circus production, was in that run - and will wear the same costumes she wore on Broadway. "They still have her name sewn in them," he said.)

Ball bristles that anyone would question doing the 50-plus-year-old musical anew.

"When you hear there's going to be a new production of 'Hamlet,' do you ask why anybody'd do that old thing? No, you ask, 'Who's starring in it?' and 'Who's the director?'

"Well, it's the same with classic musicals. They still resonate. 'The Sound of Music' is about love, love of God, love of man, love of humanity. We still care about love.

" 'The King and I' may have been written in 1951, but it is very much relevant today. Remember the scene in which the King says to Anna, 'I think your Moses shall have been a fool' and there's the discussion about how the Bible says the Earth was created in seven days and the King says everyone knows that's impossible. Anna explains that the Bible was written by men of faith, not science, and they were trying to explain in their way the origin of this incredible creation.

"Well, who'd have thought we'd still be talking about that debate in 2005 - but here we are!

"And there's the scene where the boy asks Anna if the king was a good king, and she says, 'I don't think any man is as good as he might have been, but this man tried.'

"What's important is that you try your utmost best. That's what audiences connect with. That's what we believe.

"That's why it's important to do a 50-year-old musical.

"Besides," he said, "in a sense this show has never been done before. This is the first time William Parry (the King), Barbara McCulloh (Anna) and Leland Ball have done it."

Ball said he prefers to take his staging cues from the actors, how they move, how they interact.

"I don't sit in my hotel room with pennies, moving them around a stage laid out on paper," he said. "Movement is best when it's natural."

And although he has directed the play before, Ball said, he's treating it as all new.

"This is the first time I've done it in this tent and with these people," he said. "I try to delete from my hard drive all that I've done before. That's what you have to do. An actor has to go on stage each night forgetting last night. And a director's the same way."

After two weeks of intensive rehearsals, Ball expects this week to be a vacation. "The truth is," he said, "once it opens, I'm finished. It belongs to the actors and the audience."
 

photo by Charr Crail  Director Leland Ball, left, and choreographer Bob Richard discuss Barbara McCulloh's dress during a rehearsal of the Music Circus production of "The King and I," opening Tuesday at the Wells Fargo Pavilion.

The King and I
WHAT: Music Circus season finale
WHEN: Opens at 8 p.m. Tuesday and continues at 8 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday, 2 p.m. Thursday, Saturday and Sunday and 7:30 p.m. Sunday (final performance)
WHERE: Wells Fargo Pavilion, 14th and H streets
TICKETS: $34-$49 (very limited availability)
INFORMATION: (916) 557-1999

Someone out there is waiting for you. Put together the right 45 words or so, and you may very well find him or her.

That's the promise offered by placing a personal ad, and it's what motivates the characters in Personals, the pleasant, humorous, very entertaining small musical presented by Act II Playhouse.

At least that promise is what motivates some of them at first. As naturally as personal ads lead to people getting together, Personals soon widens its scope to the whole dating scene. This approach tends to fuzz the focus on particular characters the audience might have wanted to know better - such as the attractive, recently divorced woman who, after five years of uneventful marriage, seeks a man to show her what she has missed. Yet it gives the several writers and composers who cooperated on the musical the opportunity to insert material not related to personal ads that considerably heightens the entertainment quotient.

Most notable is a continuing sequence about a painfully shy, socially inept guy listening to endless lessons on tape about what to say and do during every step of a relationship. These hilarious scenes, performed by Aaron Cromie, are the comic heart of the show.

Another good extraneous scene involves Barbara McCulloh and Ellie Mooney as women who take a break from dating men to live and love together for a while before returning to their heterosexual ways. Don't quite know why the bit is in the show, but with these performers playing it and singing the song it's built around, "I Could Always Go to You," the scene works well.

Not so successful is a running story line about a guy who, as a joke, runs a personal ad seeking (let me see if I can get this right) a hairy, cross-dressing midget. He actually hooks up with one and finds his life changed by the relationship he and his wife develop with the ad answerer. The situation is out of place with the rest of the show and its outcome seems forced.

As he usually does in the musicals he directs for Act II, William Roudebush has assembled an excellent cast of performers with contrasting personalities who play well off one another. His staging is sharp and inventive, and under his direction the six performers (Mollie Hall, Scott Boulware and Christopher Sapienza are the other three) connect closely with the material. It's a talented, attractive ensemble.

Whether you're an SWF, DBF, WWF, GWM or FTX (don't try to figure that one out, I just made it up), you should find Personals an enjoyable way to spend a couple of hours. To use an acronym that predates personal ads, it's PDG.

Personals

Book and lyrics by David Crane, Seth Friedman and Marta Kauffman; music by William K. Dreskin, Joel Phillip Friedman, Seth Friedman, Alan Menken, Stephen Schwartz, Michael Skloff; directed by William Roudebush; music direction by Vince di Mura; set by Nick Embree; lighting by Janet Embree; costumes by Courtney Bambrick; sound by John Mock.

The cast: Scott Boulware, Aaron Cromie, Mollie Hall, Barbara McCulloh, Ellie Mooney, Christopher Sapienza.

Playing at: Act II Playhouse, 56 E. Butler Ave., Ambler, through June 5. Tickets are $26-$30. Information: 215-654-0200 or www.act2.org.
 

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Contact theater critic Douglas J. Keating at 215-854-5609 or dkeating@phillynews.com. Read his recent work at http://go.philly.com/dougkeating.
 

"Show Boat" docked Thursday night in a familiar port of call, with all hands on deck. The crew was in fine voice and enjoyed smoother sailing than the local cruise ship has lately -- then again, the destination was Midtown, not Mexico.

Delaney Auditorium at Murphy High School, once home to Mobile Opera, was almost filled, and the audience responded to the dynamic cast, a mix of young and not-so-young, in this concert version of the 1927 Broadway hit.

Capt. Jerome Shannon, firmly in command of the Mobile Symphony Orchestra, will take the helm for the third and final performance of "Show Boat" at 7:30 tonight.

 Shannon, artistic director for Mobile Opera, made a shrewd choice for the debut of the Landmark American Musical series, which replaces the durable (and profitable) "Bravo Broadway!" Kern's music still evokes an emotional response, as it did Dec. 27, 1927, when it opened on Flo Ziegfeld's Broadway stage.

With its mix of black and white performers, "Show Boat" revealed the human condition in all its complexity: love, heartbreak, racial prejudice, gambling, alcoholism and the inexorable passage of time symbolized by the mighty Mississippi.

Musical theater, like opera, is more satisfying with full sets and costumes, but this concert strips away the trappings to reveal music at once compelling and heartfelt. Such music demands extraordinary talent, and Shannon again chose wisely.

Paula Broadwater, well known to Mobile audiences, is Julie La-

Verne, daughter of a white father and black mother, whose own mixed-race marriage lands her in trouble with the law. Although Broadwater has relatively little time in the spotlight, she bears the ironic weight of the story, and her mature, seen-it-all pragmatism earns our empathy.

Broadwater has a torch-singer's voice that serves her well in her showpiece, "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man of Mine," and she is ably backed by Sabrina Elayne Carten (as Queenie) and a full-bodied chorus.

Carten has sung with Houston Grand Opera, New York City Opera and was the Queenie understudy for the first national tour of the Hal Prince version of "Show Boat." She is an imposing presence, and she lights up the stage with tunes such as "Queenie's Bally-Hoo," in which she instructs Cap'n Andy how to "tout" the show to lure black audiences.

As Cap'n Andy Hawks, narrator and owner of the Cotton Blossom, Fred Baldwin had mixed success opening night. He arrived in full strut, smiling and greeting the audience and introducing the characters. His narration, which he read from notes at a lectern, at times was halting and hard to hear, punctuated by odd, distracting pauses. Ever the showman, Baldwin seemed to hit his stride by the finale.

Quincy Roberts has waited a long time to perform the play's signature number, "Ol' Man River," and he does it admirably, with a low-bass rumble that gives the lyrics an undeniable power:

"What does he care if de world's got troubles?

What does he care if de land ain't free?

... Ol' Man River,

He mus' know sumpin' but don't say nuthin'

He jes' keeps rollin' rollin' along."

The roles of Magnolia and Ravenal are filled by two impressive newcomers, Melanie Denzlinger and Scott MacLeod, whose voices are well suited to musical theater and opera.

Denzlinger, the soprano who won last year's Madame Rose Palmai-Tenser Scholarship Competition, has the beauty and big voice required for a career on either stage. She makes a striking Mobile debut in this show, especially when one considers the amount of stage time required of her, solo and with MacLeod.

This handsome couple are at their best in the long and soulful "Make-Believe" and "You Are Love," but Denzlinger really turns up the heat in Act II when a sadder, wiser Magnolia, abandoned by the man she loves, sings "After the Ball."

MacLeod's Ravenal (of the "Tennessee Ravenals") is equal parts sweetness and swagger, a seasoned riverboat gambler who runs out on his wife but eventually is reunited with her. MacLeod's emotional performance of "You Are Love" near the play's end is a highlight.

The revelation here is the energetic duo of Mark Martino and Barbara McCulloh, who play the song-and-dance team Frank and Ellie Schultz. These two steal almost every scene in sight, and for good measure, the stunning McCulloh ventures into the audience -- much to the surprise and delight of gents in the front rows.

   If Philip Barry had done nothing else, he would still be remembered as the playwright who provided Katharine Hepburn with her two juiciest roles. The more noteworthy came in 1939 with The Philadelphia Story. But 12 years earlier, he had written Holiday, in which she starred with Cary Grant on film. It is the seldom-revived latter work that Bristol Riverside Theatre has picked, rather than emulate the various versions of Dickens this season.
   But there is a reason Holiday is so infrequently staged. It is an early work; the playwright had not yet developed either his wit nor his social-skewering techniques of his later efforts. For much of the evening, the play seems like a pretentious attempt to suggest an American George Bernard Shaw. Barry's intention clearly is to play jocular with the upper classes and its foibles but loads his work with stereotypes, all with viewpoints and, like so many young writers, fails to focus on his major concerns.
   It must be remembered that in the '20s and '30s, the actors were the least costly items of any particular production. This Holiday has 11 characters, when seven would be enough.
   The plot is simple and straightforward. Johnny Case is a hard-working, up-and-coming young man devoted to heiress Julia Seton. Johnny gradually learns that his misgivings about joining the capitalist workforce conflict sharply with Julia's monetary values. By contrast, Julia's sister, Linda, greatly influenced by friends from academia, the Potters, has a joyful iconoclastic approach to life and downright shuns the upper-class social whirl. Julia and Linda's brother, Ned, desperately wants to compose music, but lacking Johnny's strength of character and Linda's backbone, retreats to alcohol instead.
   The many conflicts merge in Act II (of three, as was common in those days) in Linda's fabulous playroom atop the family's four-story townhouse at a New Year's Eve party.
   The play is usually described as "a comedy." Bristol Riverside calls it "a carnivalesque romp." But the periods between laughs stretch out and playwright Barry includes serious messages and subplots. In particular, this production presents the father as a villain, deriding his children when they oppose him, attempting to dominate everyone around him.
   And it must be said that the company is not always on the same page comedically. The first act, with its need to establish the exposition, is particularly enervating. Gerritt VanderMeer, as Johnny, has bright moments; Lanie MacEwan, as Linda, has even more. But Lynette Knapp, as Julia, shows none of the fire and char she would have needed to entice Johnny on a Lake Placid vacation. And John O'Hara and Alana Gerlach almost seem to be interrupting when they appear on stage.
   It is not until Act II that Barbara McCulloh and Edward Keith Baker, as the Potters (the academics), make their entrance that the show shakes itself from stupor. But then the playwright allows himself only so much before he shuffles them aside and the light fades.
   Director Susan Atkinson has pushed the time of the piece from 1927, as originally written, to 1936. Aside from a few frills and furbellows on the costumes, it apparently makes little difference. No mention is made of the Depression, or for that matter, any other significant event. It still runs from about mid-December until mid-January, thereby earning its title in the process.

Holiday continues at Bristol Riverside Theatre, 120 Radcliffe St., Bristol, Pa., through Dec. 19. Performances: Wed., Sat. 2, 8 p.m.; Thurs.-Fri. 8 p.m., Sun. 3 p.m. Tickets cost $29-$37. For information, call (215) 785-0100. On the Web: www.brtstage.org

   Holiday, Philip Barry's 1928 comedy about a screwed-up high-society family, begins on Christmas Day and concludes New Year's Day. It's an ideal production for audiences in search of a little seasonal cheer — but who are weary of being hit over the head with theatrical candy canes each December.
   Bristol Riverside Theatre is staging Holiday Nov. 30 to Dec. 19, with Gerritt VanderMeer and Lynette Knapp playing Johnny Case and Julia Seton, the roles made famous by Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn in the 1938 George Cukor film. The production also features a pair of actors who made their first appearances at BRT in its inaugural 1987-1988 season — Barbara McCulloh (The Robber Bridegroom) and Brendan Mulvey (Gift of the Magi).
   Mr. Mulvey plays Henry — all-knowing servant to the Seton family. "Like all such people of that ilk, you keep your eyes open and your ears open," he says. "It seems like I've been around pretty much bloody forever, so that you're a trusted servant and people aren't afraid to speak out in front of you."

 The Yardley, Pa., resident notes that unlike Mr. Barry's better-known work, The Philadelphia Story (also made into a Grant-Hepburn movie, directed by Cukor), Holiday carries a subtle message.
   "Everybody knows 'The Philadelphia Story,' the old drawing-room comedy thing about the better classes as it were," says Mr. Mulvey, "and one of the things that's nice about this — while it's similar with its strong, independent heroine — the message is very personal. It's sort of anti-commercial: 'Things don't buy you happiness.'
   "What a wonderful show," he continues, "because it's light, yet it has some serious aspects to it. It shows how money has not bought this dysfunctional family happiness. But you have the one independent young man (Johnny) who comes in and meets his soulmate in Linda. They seem to have the best chance to show that it's who you are and the way you relate more than what you have, which is sort of a holiday message."
   A longtime humanities professor at Bucks County Community College, Mr. Mulvey retired from full-time teaching seven years ago. He began acting 24 years ago on a dare from his students. "I was teaching (Henrik) Ibsen to acting students, and in their youthful, arrogant manner they said, 'You can talk about it but you can't do it.' I said, 'Sure I can.' They challenged me and I think this is 90-some shows I've done since then."
   Ms. McCulloh has quite a few roles under her belt too, although she began acting at a much earlier age than Mr. Mulvey. She's appeared at BRT more than a dozen times, including last season's The Skin of Our Teeth, and is just coming off a production of Jekyll & Hyde in Raleigh, N.C., that starred rocker Sebastian Bach of Skid Row fame. "An actor he's not, so maybe the Jekyll suffered a little bit, but the Hyde stuff, when he's screaming it and rolling around on the floor and flipping that blond hair, it was great."
   In Holiday, Ms. McCulloh plays Susan Potter, best friend to leading lady Julia Seton. "She's not a Rockefeller, but she's a Whitney or a Guggenheim, so she has money too, but she doesn't live her life in the same way these wealthy socialites do. Making money and having money is not the be all and end all...
   "Her husband (played by BRT Artistic Director Edward Keith Baker) is the only other one who actually sees the truth and tells it," Ms. McCulloh continues. "Everyone else is falling in love with the wrong people and she's going, 'Folks, wake up.'"
   Ms. McCulloh's real-life husband is fellow BRT favorite Brad Little, whom she met in Bristol in that long-ago production of The Robber Bridegroom. Mr. Little is an international musical theater star for The Phantom of the Opera, and will soon travel to China in that show. The couple shares a New York City apartment, but five years ago purchased a home on Radcliffe Street in Bristol as a sort of actors' retreat.
   "People are constantly dropping by, 'Hey, can I spend a few days on the river?'" Ms. McCulloh says. "You're never quite sure who will be there. There's a lot of stuff that gets cooked up around that breakfast table."
   The only thing that's getting cooked up this week is the Thanksgiving turkey. In fact, Ms. McCulloh seems more concerned with properly defrosting the bird and entertaining the in-laws than any jitters about her role in Holiday.
   "I'll come live at the house, and the entire family is coming for Thanksgiving, and Brad leaves (for China) two days after that," she says. "It's really nice to be able to be here for all of that, and have work and be able to work, but not feel burdened with a great big job or else be in a strange place. I have a life here, or at least part of my life here."

Holiday plays at Bristol Riverside Theatre, 120 Radcliffe St., Bristol, Pa., Nov. 30-Dec. 19. Performances: Wed., Sat. 2, 8 p.m.; Thurs.-Fri. 8 p.m.; Sun. 3 p.m. Tickets cost $29-$37. For information, call (215) 785-0100. On the Web: www.brtstage.org

Houdini is a new musical featured in the New York Musical Theatre Festival. It tells the story of Harry Houdini, the famous magician/escape artist.

There’s plenty of room for debate among theatergoers as to what constitutes a good musical. Some extol the intellectually rigorous works of Sondheim as the pinnacle of American musical theatre, while many prefer the comfortably classic Rodgers & Hammerstein sound. Still others wouldn’t set foot in a Broadway house unless the score throbbed with a rock & roll beat, as in Hair or Rent; and a sizable population remain easily delighted by the spectacle and “Broadway-Lite” melodies of Frank Wildhorn.

Houdini, The Musical, presented this week as part of the New York Musical Theatre Festival, bypasses niche limitations and aims to please, pure and simple. The life of the great escape artist Harry Houdini (born Eric Weiss, in Hungary in 1872) has a universally appealing show-biz “rags to riches” trajectory: a Jewish immigrant who began as a vaudeville magician and wound up a world phenomenon, Houdini is portrayed as a man of resilience, passion, and innovation, with a sense of humor and enough mythic proportion (“No chain, no lock in the world can hold me!”) to capture the world’s (and an audience’s) imagination. His outsized persona, and the backdrop of history during his lifetime, fit the scope and sweep of old-school Broadway musicals to a tee. It’s a perfect marriage of subject and genre.

And you get a heaping plate full, with all the basic food groups and then some: generous spectacles from the early days of vaudeville, the romance of circus life, the hard knocks of trying out the act and rejection after rejection; a tortuous love triangle involving his wife and his brother, and a subplot with his devoted mother and the psychic who claims to be able to contact her from beyond; an educating and steady parade of cameos by famous names from history—Buffalo Bill, P.T. Barnum, Florenz Ziegfeld, and Arthur Conan Doyle; the rapturous cliché of the fateful “Ah ha!” when Houdini stumbles upon his true calling as a master of escapes; and, best of all, a glorious helping of real, old-time magic tricks, oversized stage illusions and heart-stopping escape routines, all very well integrated into the natural flow of the show. Your jaw drops like a kid's, you clamor for more, and it feels great.

William Scott Duffield’s music succeeds best when delivered in the vernacular of a Coney Island strolling barbershop quartet in juicy numbers typical of that bygone era. But the subplots and private soliloquies, in which the characters reflect on their struggles, are composed using an anachronistic pop modality. Each modern song bursts the bubble that would have kept the audience fully transported back in time. I suppose they do lend a sense of serious “This Is The Moment” purpose to the evening, useful for teaching your kids how to sit still in the theatre while people sing about "grown-up stuff" like envying your brother and running off with his wife. Thankfully, they tend to seep in one ear and quickly exit the other, making way for an old-fashioned razzle-dazzle number sung by some famous historical personage. A big water-torture escape trick gets wheeled on stage, and everyone’s happy again.

And while the creators collectively have distilled an admirably clear and progressing plot—easy enough for kids to follow yet complex enough for adults to become absorbed—there are plenty of shrug-inducing short cuts. James Racheff’s book, chock full of colorfully drawn characters, repeatedly favors a bright, darting quick-strike approach that tells you information and leapfrogs over important events with terse summaries and snapshots. I’d welcome news of an overhaul, but so much of the show is cheerful, warm-hearted and moving, it’s more than possible to forgive, relax, and enjoy.

The current production provides a very credible idea of how a Broadway evening of Houdini, The Musical—if tinkered with no further—would feel. Though few of the current performances include nuance, the whole affair is well staged by Gabriel Barre, and the all-Equity cast offers a uniformly healthy and committed gusto. Kudos especially to Timothy Gulan, who embodies the legend and amazing courage of Houdini while making him very approachable and sympathetic. He’s also mastered the physicality of the escapes and handling of the magic with an authority that grounds the entire show.

I’d take kids and out-of-towners in a heartbeat, knowing they’d see an uplifting show about an American legend who gave inspiration to an entire generation by never giving up. It’s unabashedly splashy with rousing old-time spirit and plenty of quality magic. I’d also bank on enjoying a first-class lobby concession at intermission, replete with magic tricks and books for sale, old-time photos of all the historical figures from the era and plenty of nostalgia. Sondheim-worshippers and “Rent-Heads” may opt to stay home, but they’d be missing a grand old time.

When Thornton Wilder's The Skin of Our Teeth opened on Broadway in 1942, it was greeted not only by tremendous critical approval but also by intense controversy.   The approval led to Wilder's second Pulitzer Prize for drama (Our Town had been recognized five years earlier); the controversy pointed out that the work seemed to have been taken from James Joyce's  Finnegan's Wake and might constitute plagiarism.

The play has sadly been overlooked by past generations. Our Town, conversely, is still staged by high schools from coast to coast, and recently on Broadway.  Teeth, however, is getting a most welcome revival by Bristol Riverside Theatre - a staging that explores Wilder's sweeping race through the history of civilization - centering on the New Jersey Antrobus family (naturally moved to Bristol, PA. for this production).  We meet Mr. and Mrs. Antrobus and their two kids - the son, Henry (nee Cain), and the daughter, Gladys (think Emily from Our Town) - a bit off center.

The family faces a series of crises: the oncoming ice age; the great flood as animals are collected two by two; war with it's inevitable famine and pestilence.  They are accompanied through it all by the family maid, Sabina, representing the eternal seductress (think of the snake in the Garden of Eden).

If this suggest allegory, you've made a good start.  The thing to remember is that the piece was written in 1941, 60 years ago, long before television, the atom bomb, AIDS, sitcoms or Monty Python.  To call it avant-garde is probably to give it less than it's due. Wilder stunned theatergoers when he eschewed scenery in Our Town.  Here he casually  dismissed many other theater customs. The work was a masterpiece of imagination and ingenuity, and as such quite naturally invited distrust that lingers to this day.

The BRT production continues the unease.  Director Edward Keith Baker has some fine performances at his disposal.  Barbara McCulloh is superb as Sabina. She made her BRT debut 15 years ago in The Robber Bridegroom at the end of the premiere season, and she is more gorgeous now.  A fine actress (although she is best known for musicals), she finds insight in the simplest dialogue.  Anthony Cummings, as Mr. Antrobus, avoids the bits of silliness some find in the role and waits patiently for Wilder's difficult third act to pull out the stops.  Karen Lynn Gorney steers a middle ground as his wife.  And Mimi Bensinger steals a few scenes as a "Psychic Advisor" (think fortune teller).

The large company manages to look busy filling the stage and the aisles.  That includes Darlene Rubin, who, after years preparing homemade bakery specialties for opening-night parties, makes her debut on stage (well, at least in the audience) a big success.

Director Baker has modernized the dialogue: Hence the use of an on-stage computer to deliver e-mail, TV sets as part of the scenery, a joke about Botox (very funny) - all charming enough.  Not so thrilling is a filmed prologue and epilogue that somewhat distort the playwright's intentions.

Perhaps we should let Sabina have the final word: "Don't forget that a few years ago we came through the depression by the skin of our teeth!  One more tight squeeze like that and where will we be?"
 
 

Humankind will survive. It always has, it always will, even if sometimes it just barely makes it through.

That is the hopeful message of Thornton Wilder's The Skin of Our Teeth, and it must have been especially reassuring at the play's debut in 1942, when the world was immersed in a war whose consequences could only be imagined. Today, the play has less resonance, and its final-act, morale-lifting lecture is more than a bit dated. Yet The Skin of Our Teeth is revived regularly, as Bristol Riverside Theatre is doing, because it is imaginative, colorful theater, still fresh, clever and innovative.

It also is challenging to present effectively. Wilder wrote an allegory of the human race, taking his typical Antrobus family from the Ice Age to the end of a devastating modern war. He proceeds from farce in the first act - featuring a pet dinosaur and a freezing prophet Moses - to a mixture of broad comedy and near-tragedy in the second, to a somber finale set among the ruins of armed conflict.

In addition to the changes in tone, the play periodically stops and the actors become themselves as they address the audience and interact with one another. Wilder wants the audience to immerse themselves in the story and characters, yet at the same time be aware that they are in their own time watching a play - and, conflating the theatrical and the real even further, that the actors are fellow humans, too. In other words, we're all in this together.

In the Bristol production, director Edward Keith Baker doesn't strike the tone or glean the consistency of performance needed to unify the play's various elements. The comedy is generally brisk and humorous, but the darker parts are flat. Although the episodes that break the fourth wall come off well enough, they seem like curious interludes rather than integral to Wilder's vision.

Still, enough works to make this production worth a visit. Not the least is a strong performance by Barbara McCulloh in the important role of Sabrina, a character who appears in various guises and regularly addresses the audience. Expressive and engaging, McCulloh is the attractive center and spark plug of the production. Playing with a personable but too-laid-back Anthony Cummings as Antrobus and Karen Lynn Gorney's bland Mrs. Antrobus, McCulloh carries the show perhaps more than she should.

Baker's staging is resourceful. Greg Mitchell's slightly askew, colorful sets are an inspiration, perfectly suited to the play's feel and purposes. Add Alan Michael Smith's costumes, and this not entirely successful Skin of Our Teeth comes wrapped in a very attractive package.
 

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Contact theater critic Douglas J. Keating at 215-854-5609 or dkeating@phillynews.com.

 Can the human race have the resiliency to survive no matter what the odds?  In this Pulitzer Prize winning comedy/drama, Mr. Wilder’s sweeping salute to human ingenuity, the answer is reassuring.  Wilder follows an American family named Antrobus, from the fictional Excelsior, NJ, through a series of surreal crises, including flood, famine, pestilence, and war.  Speeding through the millennia with poise and flair, this model family beats the odds every time.  Their survival is a testament of faith in humanity.  In 1941, the author of Our Town, created this masterpiece of imagination and spirit that struck a deep chord that rings even truer today.  Charming, satirical, and poignant, it shines the spotlight back on us, doing what we do best: we survive, if only by “the skin of our teeth”.

 BRT’s Artistic Director Edward Keith Baker will direct this tribute to the endurance of the human spirit.  Mr. Baker has assembled a top-notch cast that will be headed by Anthony Cummings, Karen Lynn Gorney and Barbara McCulloh.  Anthony Cummings, who will play Mr. Antrobus, was seen on Broadway in Waiting In The Wings where he played Lauren Bacall’s son.  In addition, he received a Helen Hayes and Dramalogue Award for Eleanor at Ford’s Theatre in DC.  BRT audiences will remember him from Funny, You Don’t Look Like A Grandmother and as FDR in Sunrise at Campobello.  Karen Lynn Gorney, who will play Mrs. Antrobus, played the romantic lead Stephanie Mangano, opposite John Travolta in the Mega-Hit Film Saturday Night Fever.  In addition Ms. Gorney is also the legendary Tara Martin, one of the original family members on ABC’s long running, award-winning All My Children: a role she originated and still plays today. Barbara McCulloh, who will play Sabina, a role made famous by the late Tallulah Bankhead, is a Broadway veteran.  Barbara played Anna opposite Lou Diamond Philips in The King and I as well as Mrs. Darling in Peter Pan starring Cathy Rigby.  Barbara is also well known to BRT audiences for her work here in 110 in the Shade, My Way, Irma La Douce, The Robber Bridegroom, Murder in a Nutshell and Blithe Spirit.

 Other members of the cast include Mimi Bensinger, Kevin Bergen, Olivia Oguma, Zach Wegner, Miriam Hyman, Earnie Philips, David J. Abers, Mark Binder, Alana J. Gerlach, Alan Kutner, James C. Tolbert and Wi-Moto Nyoka.

 The Skin of Our Teeth has previews on January 27 and 28, 2004.  Opening Night is January 29th and the show runs through February 15, 2004.  Tickets range in price from $27 to $39.

 Mini and flex subscriptions for the 2003 – 2004 Season are still on sale with savings of up to 60% over single ticket purchases.  Special Event evenings and performances as well as subscriber benefits, make it the best time to join the BRT family.  Call the Box Office at 215-785-0100 for information and subscriptions, or visit us on the web at www.BRTstage.org.

 For information regarding Bristol Riverside Theatre, this press release or to arrange for interviews call David J. Abers at 215-785-6664.
 
 

Even though Mark Twain could be an acerbic religious skeptic, his stories of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden remain among his most popular writings.

Some were published before his death in 1910, but others didn't appear until Letters From the Earth was issued in 1962. And from this wealth of witty material the American Heartland Theatre asked playwright James Still to fashion a new play.

Still, who wrote and directed last season's successful production of "Looking Over the President's Shoulder," was on hand last week for the final rehearsals of "The Diaries of Adam and Eve -- Searching for Eden," and took time to talk about his approach to the two-actor piece.

"You know, I've known about Mark Twain's Adam and Eve stories since I was in high school," a weary Still said one afternoon after having arrived earlier in the day on the red-eye from Los Angeles. "I remember finding them funny and interesting and I liked the point of view. So it's been rattling around in there. But it was Paul and Lilli who approached me, actually, who said, `Do you know this material and would you be interested?' "

Still was referring to Paul Hough, the Heartland's director of production, and Lilli Zarda, the company's executive director. Hough is directing the world-premiere production running through Oct. 19.

"We actually commissioned it," Hough said. "I've been aware of these (stories) for a long time....We looked at couple of other adaptations that are on the circuit...and decided we would like to do our own, since we had James' friendship to make use of. How little did we know how far he would take it."

This is not the first attempt to adapt the Adam and Eve tales for the stage, but Still wanted to write something unique. And the stories themselves posed significant roadblocks.

"Every (project) has its own peculiar kind of challenges and surprises," Still said. "With this one, going into it what I knew was that of course we wanted it to be a two-act full-length play, and what I also knew was that Mark Twain's stories are very, very, very short.

"So I jumped in and at the end of the first act I realized suddenly what the second act was going to be and that was the big breakthrough. It's what is unique about this take on Twain's stories."

The conceit Still settled on resulted in almost two separate plays. In Act 1 we meet Adam and Eve more-or-less as we would expect them to be. But in Act 2 they have been catapulted into the present with thousands of years of shared experience.

"So Act 1 is really a riff on the Twain stories and then Act 2 is really a leap from those stories," he said. "We leap into the present, but Adam and Eve have only aged 25 years and so we see them in middle age, having been married thousands of years. And most people who are married know what that feels like."

And while each act is set in the Garden of Eden, there are major differences.

"There's a line in the original Twain in one of the Adam and Eve diaries, where Eve talks about how the Garden of Eden will make a lovely summer resort," Still said. "And Adam says, `What's a summer resort?' And she says, `I have no idea.'

"And that kept coming back to me and so in Act 2 the Garden of Eden has become a summer resort, which is where they come back for the first time since they left. And it's changed dramatically, just as they have."

Hough said the performing style and tone in the first half of the play varies widely from what follows. The first act is highly stylized, almost in a commedia dell'arte tradition, while the second act is very contemporary and played realistically.

"The day he told us where the second act had taken him, Lilli and I kind of dropped our teeth," Hough said. "The piece could be done in so many ways. You could do the Adam and Eve stories on a 19th century concert stage in a ball gown and tuxedo. You could do it in any style, from readers theater to something as physicalized as this one."

Still's play, Hough said, is "enormously contemporary. It has elements of...vaudeville in it. It has echoes of postmodernism. It certainly has a deconstructed quality in it. It's like two different plays with elements in either act informing the other."

Still said he sees the play as the first love story.

"One interpretation of Genesis is that it's a story about innocence about the beginning. The first three words of the Bible, at least in the translations that we know, are `in the beginning.' So that's what we're looking at, the beginning of a relationship. And Act 2 is more of the middle of a relationship."

How much of Twain's writing ended up in the script? Some.

"There's definitely a lot of invention in it, but it's definitely sitting on the back of those stories," Still said. "They're very sturdy. The diaries are not interlocked stories. They're separate stories, so one of the tricks, of course, is how to create dramatic action out of that.

"But certainly there's really great, rich material to work from. It was fun. It was really fun to look at Mark Twain, to look at the choices that he made, his use of language -- his love of language. That was certainly inspiring to me."
 

Barbara's Bristol Concert

On a hot August Sunday afternoon we welcomed the coolness of Bristol Riverside's Theater for the last of it's summer concerts, especially since this one featured Barbara McCulloh.  The talented company featured 3 men and 3 women, and Barbara looking gorgeous in a red chiffon dress was a stand out.  The theme of the show was "Broadway Love Affair" and did not refer to Broadway love songs but to the love that performers themselves have for the Great White Way.  The whole company sang the opening medley which included "On Broadway", "Forty-second Street", "Fascinating Rhythm", "That's Entertainment" and a rousing "Be Our Guest".

Each of the performers in turn sang about four numbers apiece and introduced themselves by recounting the spark that led them to Broadway.  Barbara's segment appeared in the second act.  She recounted that while she was growing up in a little rural town between Baltimore and Washington no one in her family had any connection with show business. In fact her father had been a spy!  Although she had wanted to act since was five years old, she entered William and Mary College in VA as a pre-med student and it wasn't until she reached college that she even saw her first show. Determined now to be an actress, she worked her way up and landed the understudy role for Anna in Lou Diamond Phillips' The King and I.  One Wednesday she arrived at the theater to find a group of "suits" who asked her if she could go on as Anna that evening with no rehearsal! OF COURSE SHE COULD!  The matinee was cancelled and she spent the afternoon in costume fittings and went on that night with no rehearsal.  She was so terrified that she doesn't remember much about it.  But she went on to do the role of Anna about 100 times!  And of course, we knew about her playing Mrs. Darling in Cathy Rigby's Peter Pan.  So naturally for our concert Barbara opened her medley with "Neverland".  Then she turned the heat on and cooed "My Heart Belongs to Daddy" and came down into the audience to flirt with the men.  My husband, Herb, was sitting at the end of the first row, so guess who got to be the recipient of all that charm!  When she sat on his lap I had to laugh recalling how Brad had sat on my lap during a song in his concert there last summer. Tit-for-tat!!  Barbara finished her segment with the popular "The Winner Takes It All" from Mama Mia and "Written in the Stars" from Aida.  The finale of the concert featured the whole ensemble singing "What I Did For Love" from Chorus Line, a tribute to the tenacity, spirit and love of actors for the stage.

Afterwards, Barbara was kind enough to grant me an interview.  When I asked her about the choice of songs for the show she said that the singers had a great deal of input. The director and she had narrowed the selection from the many that she had brought with her, so her songs were personally very meaningful. Then I asked her whether she considered herself primarily an actress or a singer. She replied that she considers herself a storyteller first, which is very evident from the way she captures the audience - whether as a ghost in the play, Blithe Spirit, which we saw a few years ago in Bristol, or as a concert singer.  Among the singing actresses whose work most influenced Barbara through the years were Julie Andrews and Mary Martin, and she also had a very close working and personal relationship with Glenn Close some years ago while doing a Shakespeare Festival together.  The writings of Eleanor Duse, the great actress of the early 20th Century, also inspired her. There are more plans for Barbara's future but she was not at liberty to discuss them. However, we look forward to seeing her again, whether singing or acting, and hopefully on Broadway!  Thank you, Barbara, for graciously spending sometime with us on that hot afternoon.

Eileen Luscombe
 

'Brighton Beach' evokes signs of recognition Underlying seriousness and tension give the production substance and value.

Saturday, October 27, 2001

By Suzanne Connelly

Memoirs might be personal reflections on the past, but Neil Simon's "Brighton Beach Memoirs" hit a universal chord with the opening-night audience at Syracuse Stage.

Throughout the theater, there were signs of recognition - from hearty laughs to murmured sympathies - which indicated that theatergoers saw their own lives mirrored in the daily life of the Jerome family.

Simon's work is often comic and poignant, and this play offers a healthy dose of each. Director Robert Moss never asks his actors to play the lines for humor alone - there is a constant underpinning of seriousness and tension that gives this production substance and value. Moss sees the play as "a tribute to generations," and Simon's perspective on the enduring quality of family relationships allows this play, set in 1937, to maintain contemporary appeal.

Although Eugene Jerome and his youthful observations form the central focus of the play, the interactions between sisters, brothers, husband and wife are equally important in honing a fine production of this work. Moss and his ensemble provide sharply etched portraits of these familial relationships.

Suzanne Grodner is superb as Kate, the often unbending mother. She commands the stage, polishing her lines as expertly as Kate polishes the dining room table. She is nicely matched by Bill Cohen as her husband, Jack. Cohen gives a nuanced performance, giving his Jack a rare warmth and dignity.

Matt Benson's Eugene is all adolescent energy, the fidgety exuberance of a young boy just growing into his body and his sexuality. Eugene's wry (and often naive) commentary garnered lots of laughs from an empathetic audience.

Adam Gertler as Stan worked well opposite Benson; they sparred like real brothers might. The scene between these two, as Stanley shares his worldly wisdom about women, was a highlight of the evening.

Barbara McCulloh was fine as Blanche, Kate's widowed sister. Blanche's character changes dramatically over the course of the play, and McCulloh convincingly handled the transition from timidity to independence. Her work opposite Nikki Coble as Nora detailed the difficulties often encountered by mothers and teen-age daughters. Coble had just the right combination of pouting and passion.

Only Marcy Leigh Finestone as Laurie, the pampered younger daughter, offered a somewhat exaggerated performance.

Peter Harrison's scenic design offered a handsome two-story set with the wonderful addition of an attic space, crammed with the memories of childhood. Patricia Darden's attractive costumes successfully captured the feel of the 1930s.

 (by Mal Vincent)

"The best performance is contributed by Barbara McCulloh as the nearsighted Aunt Blanche, who is forced to live with her sister after her husband dies. At first, McCulloh seems a bit young for Blanche, but eventually convinces us that she is a woman who knows the indebtedness in which she lives.  Her two daughters also live here, and there is talk that the family may be joined by refugees from Poland.  McCulloh has several second-act scenes that prove she has captured the charcter. "

TheatreFest's Stylish & Slick 'Bees' Satirizes the Seductive Lure of Fame

Barbara McCulloh employs her toes, ankles and lower calves as other actresses might exploit their well-endowed torsos, limpid eyes, beautifully bobbed proboscises or unerringly expressive hands (all of which this petite knockout can rightly claim her own).
Playing the sensually coiled question mark  Alexa Vere de Vere - mysterious mistress of con and self-invention in the current TheatreFest production of Douglas Carter Beane's slick comic romp "As Bees in Honey Drown" - McCulloh punctuates each witty riposte and suggestive come-on with  a sexy point of the toe, twist of the ankle and thrust of the thigh.
Even standing perfectly still, this Sally Bowles/Holly Golightly/Auntie Mame amalgam is most definitely hot stuff, but of the infinitely elegant variety.  Spouting  Alexa's mantra, "You're not the person you were born; you're the person you were meant to be," the actress makes immediate converts of her audience as she does of every one of the play's unwittingly spellbound acolytes fatally drawn into her alluring mix of deceit and scam.
Beane's Off-Broadway hit from the 1997 season is so glibly written, seamlessly fashioned and chock-full of surface glimmer, that it runs the risk of being hoisted on it's own petard.  Satirizing the "fame without accomplishment" syndrome that fuels so much of American popular culture, the author drops a veritable shopping bag (Saks Fifth Avenue, if you please!) of names  and "must haves" straight out of the latest issue of People magazine.
In fact, this tabloid tally sheet of "ins and outs" inspires the play's opening scene, when "hot" young writer Evan Wyler (nee Erik Wolenstein) is photographed shirtless for a People piece promoting his new book.  Immediately following, Evan, played with irresistible charm and ingenuousness by Matthew Montelongo, receives a call from actress/agent/promoter par excellence Alexa, inviting him for lunch to discuss creating a screenplay out of the story of her life.
"That's how culture is maintained," she assures the totally bamboozled, newly suited (at Alexa's prompting) neophyte author, when approached by an air-kissing Hollywood wannabe during a subsequent restaurant outing.  "Over lunch and on the way to the restroom."
"You are confection, pure confection," drivels Evan, up 'til now a confirmed gay man but about to hit the sack with his new lady love.
That all is not as it seems becomes quickly obvious, even to a besotted Evan. After being violently assaulted by a former Alexa devotee named Skunk (R. Ward Duffy in a bruising confrontation skillfully choreographed by director Peter Bennett), he begins to uncover a slew of "taken" former buddies of the slippery queen of hype.  Played splendidly by Duffy, Christopher Swan, Robyn Corujo and Jessica Richardson, this colorful crew includes "former husband," Mike Stabinsky. whose tragic suicide had been tearfully recounted by Alexa the night before.
With  a  $15,000 Alexa-inspired credit card bill demanding recompense, Even is spurred to action.  Revenge has never been sweeter.
Director Bennett has insured that pace and style are the earmarks of this production, utilizing Bill Motyka's modular setting, lit to perfection by Harry Feiner, to great advantage.  Everyone looks quite "chi-chi" thanks to Deborah J. Caney's stylish costume design.
Catch  "As Bees in Honey Drown" if just to see McCulloh and Montelongo at work.  Totally credible and engaging, they'll almost make you ignore your aching sense  that author Beane's prodigious talent, somewhat wasted here, could well produce a significantly more substantive and original piece of social satire in a future go round.

To paraphrase Cole Porter, is Alexa Vere de Vere the real turtle
soup, or merely the mock?
That’s the question Evan Wyler comes to ask himself in Douglas
Carter Beane’s witty off-Broadway hit, “As Bees in Honey Drown,” now at
TheatreFest in Montclair.
No one could wonder why Evan is fascinated with this fabulously
flamboyant socialite. She’s a latter-day Sally Bowles who sallies into his
life and bowls him over.
Why him? Because he’s a writer, and, as she says in her trademark
fashion, “Je suis knocked out by art.”
So she tells this author that she has a “movie idea up her Gucci
sleeve” — and she’ll pay him $1,000 a week to work on it. It’s the story of
her own life, of course, detailing her adventures with such pals as the Duke
of Chichester.
But is Alexa telling her real life story? She seems flighty, but
will she flee? Though Evan is gay, he’s quickly losing his heart to her. But
will he lose more still? She calls him “lamb” — but is she trying to fleece
him?
In any production of “As Bees in Honey Drown,” there must by a
dynamic and extraordinary actress on hand, and the TheatreFest production
sure has one in Barbara McCulloh. The actress has style and panache, not
just in spades, but in no-trump. And no one on stage will trump her all
night long.
What McCulloh also has is a breathy and amazingly intoxicating
voice. Never mind those bees drowning in honey; it appears that her vocal
cords are happily drenched in the stuff. Those who remember what Tammy
Grimes and Glynis Johns sounded like will find it an engaging mixture of
both.
If that isn’t enough — and it is — McCulloh shines again in the
second act, in a flashback where we see Alexa in her younger years. The
actress is splendidly able to create a completely different person here.
Though the character of Evan is gay, he must also play the straight
man — meaning the reactor — to this fabulous human being. Matthew Montelongo
is perfectly right for the role, for he has a face that is as open as an
open-faced sandwich. He makes an audience care about him and his plight.
Also potent are R. Ward Duffy, as a painter from Alexa’s past who
sure has a great deal to say about her, and Christopher Swan, who plays four
different roles, manages to make every of them distinct — and gets great
laughs from all of them. Robyn Carujo and Jessica Richardson lend able
support.
So director Peter Bennett deserves great credit for the way he
handles his cast. But he errs in treating this small play as if it were a
big one. On Bill Motyka’s much too spacious set, Bennett sets the action in
nooks and crannies, all too far away from the audience, when he should be
working dead center. That the Studio Theatre is acoustically not one of
seven wonders of the state foils the audience from hearing all of Beane’s
witty dialogue and McCulloh’s terrific way with it. Harry Feiner’s lighting
would be more appropriate for a murky drama than an eccentric comedy.
Those who are sharp of sight, hearing, and mind, though, will
greatly enjoy “As Bees in Honey Drown.” Where else are you going to find a
play that asks, “If you had to sleep with one of the Three Stooges, whom
would it be?”

Leave It To Me, the Cole Porter musical that launched Mary Martin into the theatrical firmament, gets a concert revival by the shoestring-budget Manhattan company called Musicals Tonight!, March 20-April 1.

Producer Mel Miller told Playbill On-Line that the production at the 14th Street Y will include three rare Porter songs intended for the 1938 score: "Information, Please," "When the Hen Stops Laying" and "Wild Wedding Bells."

The plot by Sam and Bella Spewack (who would later pen the libretto to Porter's Kiss Me, Kate) concerns the U.S. ambassador (Kenny Morris) to the Soviet Union, appointed to the position because his rich wife (Robin Baxter) gave dough to the Democratic Party. A publisher (Gordon Connell) wants the job, so he sends a reporter (Michael Scott) to Moscow to get the ambassador recalled. The scribe gets attention from two women (Jamie Day and Barbara McCulloh), and wins one.

The cast also includes Keith Benedict, Courtney Blythe Gruda, J. Michael McCormick, L.J. Mitchell, Seth Muse, Lois Ann Saunders, Ed Smit, Noah Weissberg, John Wisiniack and Will Woodrow.

The score includes such Porter songs as "My Heart Belongs to Daddy" (which Martin, playing gold-digger Dolly Winslow, introduced), "Get Out of Town," "Tomorrow" and "Most Gentlemen Don't Like Love." The original production ran 291 performances and starred Victor Moore, Sophie Tucker, William Gaxton and Tamara.

Thomas Mills directs. Mark Hartman musical directs. Tickets are $17. Performances are on the mainstage of the 14th Street Y, 344 E. 14th St. (Between First and Second Avenues). For reservations, call (212) 362-0713.

NEW YORK — Had a nice chat with Mel Miller, the one-man band known as Musicals Tonight! which has presented staged readings of musicals from the ‘20’s (Dearest Enemy), '30s (I Married an Angel), ‘40s (Look Ma, I’m Dancin’, which got recorded), ‘50’s (Goldilocks, which yielded a page one Sunday New York Times story) ‘60’s (Foxy, recorded and now being mixed), and ‘70s (King of Hearts).
Now he’s revisiting the ‘30s with Leave It to Me, the 1938 Cole Porter show. Though Sam and Bella Spewack’s book does sound more contemporary than that: A woman donates a ton of money to a presidential campaign so that her husband can become an ambassador.

It’s the show that made Mary Martin a star, thanks to "My Heart Belongs to Daddy." Other well-known Porter songs include "Get out of Town," "Tomorrow," and "Most Gentlemen Don’t Like Love."

Miller was bubbling over with enthusiasm over the last-named. "You want to hear a nice irony?" he asked. "Robin Baxter, who appeared in my first show, Let It Ride, is singing ‘Most Gentlemen Don’t Like Love’ in this one. Last year, she appeared in another Cole Porter show, Red, Hot and Blue at Goodspeed, where she sang the same song. But they interpolated it there. Here, it’s the actual song from the actual show, so she’s finally getting to do it right," he added with a wild burst of a laugh.

Not that Miller isn’t above making a change in Leave It to Me. "But only a little one," he insisted. "There’s a part for a Prince Tomashevsky, a dethroned Russian noble. We just couldn’t find anyone to fit the bill. But then I noticed Lois Ann Saunders, who had this regal bearing. So we’ve made her Princess Tomashevsky. I hope the purists don’t drive me crazy about it."

I doubt they will, and told him so. But Miller does get a hard-core musical-loving audience. "Most of them are very old, which is why we start at 7 at night — so they can get home and get to bed earlier," he admitted. "When they ask me about a senior discount, I tell them, ‘We charge extra for seniors!’ One woman who came in a wheelchair said she didn’t think she should pay because, after all, she brought her own chair." And then he gives out with another laugh-eruption deep from his gullet.

Miller uses his own money and doesn’t mind losing it. "But I’m losing less," he crowed. "I think we might even break even with this one!"

What’s he’d really like to do is That’s the Ticket, the 1948 out-of-town closing with a score by Harold (I Can Get It for You Wholesale) Rome, book by those Casablanca collaborators Julius and Philip Epstein, and direction (but not choreography!) by Jerome Robbins.

"The Lincoln Center Library had Act One of it, but not Act Two," Miller reported. "But I sure liked what I read of Act One. I got in touch with Harold Rome’s grandson Josh, who told me all his grandfather’s stuff had been given to Yale. I went up there, and found the entire score. Now all I needed was the script to Act Two."

Miller got in touch with the Epstein Brothers’ lawyer, but found him no help. On a whim, he called George S. Irving — "who appeared in my So Long, 174th Street," he noted. "George told me that the last time he’d visited Jerome Robbins, that he saw the script of That’s The Ticket in his house."

Of course Robbins had since died, so Miller couldn’t just call up the legendary director-choreographer and ask for a copy. But he did learn that Robbins’ papers had been donated to the Billy Rose Collection, so he gave them a call.

"This lovely lady in the dance department said that she had plenty of boxes of Robbins’ material right there in her office, and that she’d be willing to take a look," he said. "The first box she opened, there it was."

Still, that didn’t mean Miller had permission to take the script. So he called around to see if there were any Epstein heirs who might grant permission. Ray Evans, one of the Let It Ride authors, knew that two sons lived in Massachusetts and California. Miller found them, and they faxed the library and okayed that a photocopy be made for him.

"Now the script is at the Robbins’ estate," he said, "because they want to excise everything he wrote in the margins."

If he and we live long enough, we may all see That’s the Ticket! Maybe Break It Up, too.

"Well," he said, "I was reading Mel Torme’s autobiography, because I was always such a fan of his. And he mentioned this musical he wrote with Bob Wells and Charles (Christine) Peck in 1950, which played in Matunuck, Rhode Island, and never got any farther. I’ve since been able to get 12 of the songs. Do you know where I can get a script?"

Leave it to Miller to find one, though. Meanwhile, Leave It to Me plays March 20-April 1 at the 14th St. Y, 344 East 14th St., New York City. Performances are Tuesdays at 7 p.m., Wednesdays at 2 and 7 PM, Thursdays and Fridays at 7 PM, Saturdays at 8 PM, Sundays at 2 and 7 PM Tickets cost $17. Call (212) 362-0713. {:-)-:}
 

      "He was despised. He was rejected," mezzo soprano Susannah Cibber (Gloria Biegler) sings during the final moments of "Joyful Noise."

Soprano Kitty Clive (Barbara McCulloh) re-creates her "tragic" interpretation of Desdemona's death scene for Handel (Charles Antalosky) in "Joyful Noise."

Scott G. Winterton, Deseret News
      She should know. The woman herself has been despised and rejected by all of London society, and she nearly backs out of singing in the premiere performance of George Frederic Handel's "Messiah" in 1743 in Covent Garden after convincing herself that the audience will be snickering at how brazen she is — an adulteress as a featured soloist in Handel's controversial work.
      Slover's finely crafted, behind-the-scenes glimpse at how Handel created his inspirational masterpiece could easily have been staged as a huge, cast-of-hundreds epic. Instead, with just eight well-defined characters (and a smattering of wry wit), Slover delivers what could become another seasonal classic.
      PTC artistic director Charles Morey, in mounting the first fully professional version of "Joyful Noise," makes good use of the company's resident designers. The production moves smoothly along as brief vignettes segue from one to another, depicting the royal politicking, the vicious pontificating from Bishop Henry Egerton's pulpit and the two-faced sniveling by soprano Kitty Clive.
      The all-Equity cast includes a number of familiar faces.
      Portly Charles Antalosky is perfectly cast as Handel, a composer whose fortunes are on the skids and who is not above recycling his own operatic and religious music for commoners in London's theaters.
      There are no weak links anywhere in the cast, which also includes Max Robinson as King George II, Handel's patron; Robert Peterson as Charles Jennens, who compiles the libretto for "Messiah" (then becomes quite agitated when he feels the music is too theatrical); Richard Mathews as John Christopher Smith, one of Handel's closest friends and supporters; Matt Loney as Bishop Egerton, who uses his pulpit for a venomous assault against Handel's work; and Libby George as Mary Pendarves, whose delightful couplets become her own battle cry in defense of the controversial oratorio.
      Gloria Biegler and Barbara McCulloh are both wonderful as the feuding sopranos, Susannah Cibber and Kitty Clive. From their show-stopping cat fight during one of Handel's early rehearsals to their eventual forgiveness of each other's faults, they are central to the drama's message of redemption.
      Maxwell's simple, yet fluid, scenery — larger-than-life framed scrims gliding in and out and the stage's warm, sepia-toned glow — help move the action along.
      If you've had a tough time finding ornate silks and brocades for your Christmas sewing, you can probably blame costume designer Carol Wells-Day. The elegantly gowned women and stylishly attired gentlemen are right on target for the period.
      Peter L. Willardson's dramatic lighting, James Prigmore's taped music and Joe Payne's sound also add considerably to the production.
 
 

JOY OF JOYS!!

Kitty Clive, played by Barbara McCulloh,
taunts singer Susannah Cibber, played by
Gloria Biegler, in Pioneer Theatre Company's "Joyful Noise."
 
 

  It is nearly impossible to grow up in Utah without hearing Handel's "Messiah." As the Christmas season rolls around, the stirring chords of the "Hallelujah" chorus become as ubiquitous as the twinkling lights on Temple Square or the powder at Alta.
    Meek types can listen to "Messiah" at any number of churches across the state, or they can spin the Mormon Tabernacle Choir's famous recording. The bold can join the thousands who annually warble along with the Utah Symphony at its "Messiah" Sing-In or join one of the community productions that dot the state from St. George to Logan.
    So, "Joyful Noise," a promising new play about events surrounding "Messiah's" premiere, is likely to find an instant audience here. Utah playwright Tim Slover refers to them as "Handel idolators"; his play opens Wednesday at Simmons Pioneer Memorial Theatre. The play was first seen in 1996 at Brigham Young University in Provo, and later was produced in several venues around the country, including an off-Broadway run at Lamb's Theatre in New York City. Pioneer Theatre Company's production will be the first full Equity production of the play.
    It's doubtful that Handel imagined at the 1742 premiere of his oratorio that, 2 1/2 centuries later, "Messiah" would be presented annually in cities as varied as Moscow, Tokyo and Manti, nor that the work's genesis would be the basis of a theater piece.
    Handel was not in a pleasant frame of mind at the time.
    The Italian operas he wrote by the dozen for his London audience were going out of fashion. His last several productions were financial flops. Handel was 55, and his long career was on the skids.
    He needed a hit.
    Matters didn't improve after Handel decided upon his new project -- an oratorio in English that told the story of Christ's life through scripture from the Old and New Testaments.
    The work now regarded by many as a supreme expression of Christian faith didn't start that way. The clergymen of Handel's day were scandalized by the composer's connections to the hurly-burly world of the London stage and his idea of presenting the life of Christ in a theater rather than a church.
    Handel's choice of soloists caused further alarm -- the female singers who could perform the difficult solos convincingly were stars from London's music halls and opera stages. Their reputations were not without blemish, and one -- Susannah Cibber -- had been at the center of a widely publicized sex scandal.
    Slover says he always considered "Messiah" part of his cultural and religious identity, but a televised performance of the oratorio by the Kings College Choir of Cambridge, England, gave him the inspiration that would propel his drama.
    The ideas behind the oratorio came through clearly in that chaste and simple performance. When a soloist sang "He was despised, rejected . . .," Slover could suddenly see the parallels between Handel's situation and the work of art he created.
    When he came upon a book about Cibber, Slover knew he had found his story. Even more than Handel, Cibber was an outcast. The redeeming effect "Messiah" has upon the lives of Handel and Cibber became the central theme of Slover's drama. Eventually the play's other characters -- all real people -- are uplifted by "Messiah," too. Gloria Biegler, who portrays Susannah, explains:
    "Handel and Susannah have both been given the boot from English society. During their journey through the creative process, they get hooked up together in an act of redemption, and they find it by way of the piece. The play is about the redemptive and the creative process, and it's also about creating our own lives through the choices we make, and the responsibility we take for those. On a double level, it's about creativity."
    Slover describes Cibber as "the Monica Lewinsky of her day."
    "There are some people who will never forgive or forget what Monica Lewinsky and Bill Clinton have done, and they will ignore any good either may have done or will do. The person who suffers in that situation is the one who can't forgive.
    "For me, the center of religious experience is forgiveness -- to ask and receive forgiveness, and to forgive others. In order to be happy, and even to be sane, those things have to be learned. One way to learn is the way Susannah learns -- by doing something wrong. She needs forgiveness and so must forgive others."
    Handel will be portrayed by Charles Antalosky, a character actor seen in several PTC productions, including "Saint Joan," "Twelfth Night," "The Diary of Anne Frank" and "The Front Page." Antalosky enjoys the challenge of portraying Handel, whom he characterizes as a well-rounded person who went into rages and could be difficult, but was also generous and had a good sense of humor. "Geniuses don't think of themselves as geniuses, you know," says Antalosky. He likes the challenge of portraying one.
    "If you play a fictional character, there is less pressure. When you act the part of a historical character, people expect you to look like the person, and sometimes that's not necessary. What you are really dealing with is an essence. In the case of Handel, I suspect I do resemble him -- although I could do without all the references in the play to his belly," says Antalosky, good-naturedly, patting his.
    Fans of the "Hallelujah" chorus will like the end of the play. Slover says the plot lines of "Joyful Noise" are brought together with a performance of the familiar chorus, made full and grand through a bit of theater magic. He laughingly adds that it's a cheap way of getting an ovation -- a reference to the tradition of standing for the "Hallelujah" chorus, as King George II did at the London premiere. Antalosky says the ending leaves the audience "uplifted and happy. It's a positive experience, and especially appropriate at this time of the year."
    "Joyful Noise" was a work-in-progress through its previous productions, and subject to changes. The version that PTC will produce has never been seen, but is essentially the same as the published version, which is about to be printed by Dramatists Play Service Inc.
    The day after "Joyful Noise" opens in Salt Lake City, it opens in Atlanta at the 14th Street Theatre. It will play in Seattle and in New Hampshire in 2001, and there is also a movie deal in the works. Meanwhile, Slover is busy writing and promoting other projects and filling a one-year appointment as a professor of theater at the University of Utah.
    Charles Morey, PTC's artistic director, is directing "Joyful Noise." Joining Antalosky and Biegler in the ensemble cast are Libby George, Matt Loney, Richard Mathews, Barbara McCulloh, Robert Peterson and Max Robinson. The ornate Baroque sets are by George Maxwell; the gorgeously flamboyant costumes are created by Carol Wells Day; those elaborate white wigs are the work of Monica McGuire.

   Share the Joy
    "Joyful Noise" has its Equity-house premiere Wednesday at Simmons Pioneer Memorial Theatre, 300 S. 1400 East in Salt Lake City, produced by Pioneer Theatre Company. Curtain times are 7:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday; 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday; and 2 p.m. for Sunday matinees. Performances with interpreters for the deaf and hard of hearing will be Dec. 4 and 5 at 7:30 p.m. The show runs until Dec. 16.
    Tickets are $17-$36. Parking is free. Discounts are available for groups and University of Utah students. Call (801) 581-6961 or visit www.ptc.utah.edu.
 

  Utah playwright Tim Slover's "Joyful Noise," a drama about George Frederick Handel creating his masterpiece, "Messiah," has been staged before — twice at Brigham Young University (where the script was initially developed), at Lamb's Theatre in San Diego and in an off-Broadway theater — all to critical acclaim.

Charles Antalosky stars as Handel and
Barbara McCulloh as Kitty Clive in "Joyful Noise."

      It's also been presented by a theater company in New Hampshire ("I have no idea what it was like," Slover says), with upcoming productions in Seattle and Atlanta. "But the production that's most exciting to me is Pioneer Theatre Company's," he said, "because I'm a Utahn, and I've always looked at PTC as being the theatrical equivalent of the Utah Jazz."
      PTC's staging of "Joyful Noise" is being touted as "the professional premiere" of the production, and Slover notes that this is, indeed, the first fully professional, Actor's Equity production of his work. (The San Diego production was semi-professional, with only one Equity player in the cast, and the off-Broadway version — also produced by Lamb's — was non-Equity.)
      For PTC, the timing of "Joyful Noise" on its 2000-2001 season couldn't be more appropriate. It's running Nov. 29-Dec. 16, just as the holiday season's multitude of "Messiah" concerts and sing-ins begins to kick in.
      PTC artistic director Charles Morey, who is directing the play, said that there's "a wonderful irony in 'Joyful Noise' in that it's based on the opening performances of 'Messiah' and the attempts of some British religious authorities of the day to ban it. Now, it floats the thought that perhaps some of those works of art that are being criticized today as being unrighteous might, indeed, have merit in the long term."
      He added, "The play is, in its own way, a deeply spiritual play. It's about the spirituality of art and the connection of art and spirituality."
     The production does include significant pieces of music — the orchestral accompaniment will be on tape and the vocal music will be presented live — but Morey explained, "It's not a 'musical' by any stretch of the imagination, but there are bits of three 'Messiah' arias in it, and it closes with an excerpt from the 'Hallelujah' chorus."
      Slover, who has taught at BYU, is currently on campus at the University of Utah, where he is filling in during Richard Scharine's sabbatical. "The fact that Tim is working on campus came about independently (of bringing 'Joyful Noise' to PTC)," said Morey, "and it's a happy coincidence."
      Although he was born in Tokyo ("Dad was in the military"), Slover considers himself a Utah native. He attended high school in Provo and went to BYU, earning his Ph.D. in Michigan, "but my wife and I have made Provo our home."
      Slover is especially pleased with PTC resident scenery-designer George Maxwell's setting for the play. "It calls for a number of locations," he said, explaining that the somewhat bare but abstract stage features "an elegant set that will really knock peoples' eyes out. It speaks volumes for the period. And everything, including the costumes, has a sort of golden tea wash on it."
     Morey notes that "Joyful Noise" calls for a fairly small cast with only eight roles:
      — Longtime PTC regulars Robert Peterson, Max Robinson and Richard Mathews will be seen, respectively, as librettist Charles Jennens, King George II and John Christopher Smith, a violist and music copyist who specialized in the replication and sale of Handel's music.
      — Charles Antalosky, seen here previously in "Saint Joan," "Twelfth Night," "The Diary of Anne Frank" and "The Front Page," will play the role of Handel.
      — The role of Susannah Cibber, the soprano with a scandalous past, is being played by Gloria Biegler, a busy New York performer ("Arcadia," "Spoils of War" and "King Lear") who appeared in PTC's productions of "The Count of Monte Cristo" and "The Crucible."
      — Libby George, seen here before in "Lettice and Lovage," "Noises Off" and the Utah Shakespearean Festival's "Merry Wives of Windsor" and "Richard III," will portray Handel's old friend, Mary Pendarves.
      — Also in the cast are Matt Loney, seen previously in PTC's "A Tale of Two Cities," "Arcadia" and "Guys and Dolls," as Bishop Henry Egerton, and PTC newcomer Barbara McCulloh — who played Anna opposite Lou Diamond Phillips in the Broadway revival of "The King and I" — as Susannah Cibber's rival, Kitty Clive.
      The day after "Joyful Noise" opens in Salt Lake City, it will also open in Atlanta at the Art Within Theatre, and it's scheduled to be produced next year by the Taproot Theatre Company in Seattle. Slover said "Joyful Noise" is now being listed in the Samuel French, Inc., catalog, "and it's being looked at in London."

PERFORMANCES will be Mondays-Thursdays at 7:30 p.m., Fridays at 8 p.m. and Saturdays at 2 and 8 p.m., Nov. 29-Dec. 16.
      Two of the performances — Monday and Tuesday, Dec. 4 and 5 — will include interpreters for the hearing-impaired.
      All seats are reserved. Tickets range from $17 to $36. Free parking is available. Group and University of Utah student discounts are available. For reservations, call 581-6961. Tickets may also be ordered online at PTC's Web site, ( www.ptc.utah.edu).

    Steve Martin's "Picasso at the Lapin Agile" is one of those productions that play much better on stage than it does on page. This clever comedy is like a well-crafted sit-com that surprises you with its intelligence, wit and word play.  I have to admit that, for me, it was like dipping into a box of forbidden chocolates.
    The Studio Arena's production, directed by Gavin Cameron-Webb, takes place in a Paris cafe (the plays title) where two of the great minds of the twentieth century find themselves discussing art, knowledge and women. "Picasso at the Lapin Agile" had its world premiere at Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre in 1993.
    The fictitious meeting between the author of "The Special Theory of Relativity," Albert Einstein (Noel Johansen) and the painter of "Les Demoiselle D'Avigono," Pablo Picasso (Jack Marshall) is never just zany fun but always creeping around the edge of the stage is the notion that  that these two great thinkers of the 20th Century had more in common  than an ability to symbolize the universe and man's place in it through lines and characters.
    Elegant solutions through simple applications is an extension of the belief that the "art that conceals art" is the most profound.  It is like that childhood game of looking at clouds and seeing all manner of fantastical scenes hidden in their amorphous shapes.
    The shape is not in the clouds but in the imagination of the perceiver.  Picasso and Einstein were playing that child's game when they took the ordinary and transformed it into the extra-ordinary.
    Martin's play being a great work of art.  It is essentially an entertainment that borders on the provocative.  But it works.
    Martin's verbal vaudeville might be one of the funniest things that the comic/actor/playwright has ever written. I have never been a great fan of his comedy but "Picasso at the Lapin Agile" is not only funny but one of the most intelligent things the "wild and crazee guy" has ever written.  Trying to describe it or convey funny lines that are delivered is difficult at best.
    The farcical work is reminiscent of a Marx Brothers of Three Stooges film.  Anarchy and mayhem rule. The only things missing are the rubber chickens and the slapstick.
    Picasso and Einstein meet at the Lapin Agile cafe in Paris in 1904, and the intellectual fireworks begin as other characters act as the tinder to their fervent imagination.  Imagine gazing at the surrealist and cubist paintings at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery and you have some idea of the multiple viewpoints entertained.
    There's also a seduction, a drawing contest, the Charles Schmeadiman (Brad Bellamy) and an important message from Picasso muse, delivered by a time traveling Elvis.
    The ensemble work is just that.  No actor stands out although there are many fine individual and group moments. Johansen and Marshall lead the charge but equally well cast and well acted are Barbara McCulloh as Germaine, the bar maid whose intelligence and wit seem to match the two illustrious customers, Jim Mohr (who appeared in the Chicago production) as the talkative Gaston, Robert Rutland's worldly bartender Freddy and dealer.
    Scott Duffy does a wonderful job giving us an Elvis interpretation that avoids the heavy schtick
usually associated with such an impersonation and Jenny Maguire deserves special  mention for her quick costume and character changes.
    "Picasso at the Lapin Agile" is a robust comedy and a good opening to the Studio Arena's mixed bag season of theatre.

(thanks to Eileen Luscombe for finding the photo)