John Steinbeck’s “Sweet Thursday”

Drama review by Suzy Williams and Brad Kay

Steinbeck fans will delight in the Pacific Resident Theatre’s production of Sweet Thursday, newly adapted for the stage by Robb Derringer and (director) Matt McKenzie.  World War II is over. Formerly happy-go-lucky marine biologist Doc returns to Cannery Row from the Army, sobered and seriously dead-set on finding meaning and purpose in his life and research. The townsfolk, alarmed at the change in him, arise en masse to return Doc to his pre-war, party-animal condition so the revels may continue. Life, love and hijinks abound.  The classic Steinbeck utterances remain:  “Everyone here is bound by gossamer threads of steel!”  – “We got to get Doc outta the slings of despond!” – “There ain’t no way to get into trouble if you keep your mouth shut.” – “It hurts my feelings when I steal.” – on and on.  Lest we forget, John Steinbeck celebrated California and populist thought for much of the last century.

The first thing we noticed about this frequently hilarious Capra-esque romp was its elaborate, cinematic scope, realized through wondrously clever use of the small stage by set designer Charles Erven. The story takes place all over town. We visit the Palace flophouse, the seashore, the diner, the dance Hall, the bodega, Doc’s laboratory, a discarded boiler as a living space, the Bear Flag Whorehouse and a drive into the sunset in a boat-turned-car. Oh, the resourcefulness!

The pace, the lighting, the excellent, consistently eye-popping period costumes, the sound – all superb. Did we mention the casting?  Here in 2012 is a room full of old-fashioned Preston Sturges Stock Company character actors – a breed we had thought extinct.  Jeff Doucette, who played Mack, the flophouse leader, took the cake for the most authentic, convincing old-school showmanship. But right up there is Eric-John Scialo as Hazel, the “special needs” strong man, Kevin Fabian as “Mr. Elegant,” the prostitutes’ gay best friend, and Dennis Madden as “Seer,” a very Venice Beach-style evolved old bum.  George Villas played bodega-keeper “Joseph-and-Mary,” and with his tight, matador form and his crisp white shirt, he turned in a delightful, mock-villainous performance. The leads, Joe McGovern, playing Doc, was a little young for the part, but still plenty sexy, and Lela Loren as “Suzy” was lovely, lovely.

For a non-musical, this show contains a surprising amount of music, a great deal of it live.  Some of the actors double very capably on trumpet, guitar and sax; singing and dancing erupt frequently among the players, and there is one stunning ensemble number.

The scrappy, all-for-one camaraderie of the play reflects of the real-life attitude of the Pacific Resident company itself.  Operating on a budgetary shoestring, but with a maximum of ingenuity and heart, Executive Producer Marilyn Fox marshals these talents to create all this goodness and suspension-of-disbelief.  She talks with the Moon on a tin can and a thread.  And this is YOUR neighborhood theatre – three stages worth – right on Venice Boulevard, one block east of Beyond Baroque and SPARC.

Run, don’t walk, to your computer, phone, semaphore or carrier pigeon and reserve yourself a seat for this compactly grand entertainment.

John Steinbeck’s Sweet Thursday

World Premiere adaptation by Robb Derringer & Matt Mckenzie

Pacific Resident Theatre

703 Venice Blvd

Venice, CA 90291

Tickets $20 – $28

Running through October 28th

For reservations:  www.pacificresidenttheatre.com

or call 310-822-8392

Theater Review: Astral Dick

By Roger Linnett

As Director Hanna Hall writes in the program’s Director’s Note, “Chaos represents the thread in the universe that allows humanity free will. Even though it is wild and unpredictable, it is part of the human condition.”

And from the opening scene of James Mathers New play, when a crazed, ranting woman (Laura Peters) crawls into an oven, in a sort of extreme Sylvia Plath maneuver, you kind of wish your seat had a safety belt because you’re definitely going down the rabbit-hole.

Enter the Homicide Detectives – The Captain (Paul Tei) and his psychic sidekick, the eponymous “Astral Dick”, Lt. Leo Fleck (Marc Hickox), a parapsychological detective, i.e., a medium with a badge, under the recreationally abusive guidance of his captain, to investigate what they ultimately determine, by way of a fluid Abbot and Costello-style repartee, is the work of a serial killer – and that’s one of the more rational scenes.

Hall uses every inch of the compact Electric Lodge stage, accented by perfectly-executed lighting, to create a modernist noir reality upon which this existential mixing of terror and freedom struts and frets, framed by a nondescript hodgepodge of architectural styles and extraneous objects, complementing the sparse, multi-functional set pieces.

The use of wooden orange crates adds a playful, almost childlike, quality to the set.

Occasionally, amateurish Mummenschanz-like figures attempt to surreptitiously deliver to, or take props from, the characters, who continue unfazed, adding another delicious layer to this tiramisu of absurdity.

The use of pre-recorded audio as Lt. Fleck communes with the Captain from his “astral plane,” synchronized to the action on stage, helps draw the audience into the screwball multi-dimensionality of Mathers’ tour de farce.

After the Captain is “killed” at the end of Act I, the intrepid, albeit insipid, Lt. Fleck, wracked by totally over-the-top anguish, vows to find his killer. As he says: “I’m a dick. It’s my job to know things.”

The play is billed as a whodunit, but in the end it doesn’t really seem to matter that the mystery isn’t solved as Fleck’s investigation leads him into a web of sex and religion. One he wants, the other he despises, but at times you can’t tell which.

The subject/object of his investigation/desire is one Marlo Montecarlo (Kaytlin Borgen): “It rhymes and it’s alliterative,” she points out.

Abetted by her conniving, lascivious mother, Bunny (Rachel Robinson), Marlo sets her sights on the tall, dark and handsome, but conflicted Lt. Fleck. Then things get really kinky. (I’d just like to add a personal note to Mr. Mathers – Thanks for undoing years of therapy with that damned Sock Monkey (the late, crispy Laura Peters)).

Fleck’s interrogation of the cult leader Master Jeshu (Dan Lawler) and his sycophantic minions (Skyler Millicano and Jessica Farr) is a glib send-up of every bad cop show or movie you ever saw, and made even zanier by the appearance of their attorney Stan (Jordan Byrne), the best Satan incarnate smarmy lawyer since Al Pacino in The Devil’s Advocate.

The finale is a Fellini-esque amalgam of bodies, and amid all the craziness is a “message,” but it’s up to each audience member to figure out what that is after they emerge from Mathers’ darkly-wacky world.

Astral Dick will be performed at The Electric Lodge, 1415 Electric Ave., Venice for the next two weekends: May 31 – June 3 and June 7 – 10. Thu., Fri., Sat. evenings at 8p.m. and a Sun. matinee at 3 p.m.

Tickets are $20, and are available at carboncopyproductions.com or at the door.

Theatrical Review: “Awake in a World that Encourages Sleep”

Reviewed by Roger Linnett

From the beginning of Raymond J. Barry’s “Awake in a World that Encourages Sleep” at the Electric Lodge, the audience is subjected to a lurching, frenetic exposition of the tormented lives of three people on the edge, presented by a top-flight trio of actors fused into a powerful ensemble. The play examines the price of power, patriotism and loyalty and how they wear on the human soul and, as Barry writes in the program notes, the “exploitation of economically weak countries by giant corporations, as described in John Perkins’ Confessions of an Economic Hit Man.”

The movements of the actors often border on vaudevillian, and their behavior is at times absurd, but the rat-a-tat dialog, with sometimes two or all three characters speaking at once, often to humorous effect, keeps the audience riveted, hardly able to catch its collective breath as the focus careens from one character to another as they rant, squabble, threaten, manipulate, cajole and struggle in their personal Dantean levels of hell.

The breakneck pace is intermittently interrupted as the action comes to a jarring halt when the characters confront each other in overtly dramatic poses and tortured expressions, or react to unheard nearby explosions of bombs, representing the omnipresent but unseen fourth character of the piece – war as the means of exploitation – that is at the core of their individual agonies.

Paul and Erica (Joseph Culp and Tacey Adams) are Albee-esque as they grapple with the loss of their son to the war which Paul encouraged his son, as the heroic and patriotic thing to join, although we learn he lied his way out of his obligation, yet claims he is a wounded and decorated veteran.

From the outset Paul seems a man on the edge of a breakdown – devious, high-strung and paranoid, a corporate tool wracked with guilt about his dead son. Erica despises him for his cowardice and for sacrificing their son, even though she too is somehow complicit in abetting the Orwellian perpetual war for perpetual peace

Edward (Raymond J. Barry) is a quirky and troubled underling in Paul’s war sustaining enterprise, bent on quitting. His movements are reminiscent of a Monty Python character, replete with silly walk and exaggerated gestures. Like Paul and Erica, he is needy, lonely and mildly sinister, but ultimately harmless.

After Paul rushes off following an intense opening spat with Erica, he invades Erica’s momentary peace and carries on a cat and mouse flirtation, wheedling and obnoxious, but also terribly vulnerable as he wrestles with his decision to leave the war-making enterprise known as the “Group”, of which it turns out, Paul is a high-powered executive, and his boss.

The play resolves with Edward reawakening in a reluctant Erica the dormant capability to love, although in the end, even as she confesses her love for him, she cannot detach herself from the broken, self-loathing Paul.

Barry’s comic yet disturbing play was first nurtured as a workshop piece at the Electric Lodge during January and February of last year, growing with each performance. It is rare to find a cast commit to a play for such a long time. It is also what makes it so seamless and professionally realized.

The play had its world premiere at the Theater for the New City, in New York in April, 2011, and has returned to its Venice nest. The play runs at the Electric Lodge through February 26, on Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm and Sundays at 2pm.

Tickets are $25, $18 for seniors, and $15 for students available thru brownpapertickets.com. Electric Lodge also offers a special $50 dinner and a show deal in association with Hal’s for the Saturday performances. Reservations for this offer must be made in advance at livearts@electriclodge.org.

Two Barrie Plays

By Suzy Williams

Have you had a good cry lately?   Have one at the Pacific Resident Theater: there are two gems by J.M. Barrie, and the second one’ll getcha. Both of them are about older women, younger men, and deception, and they’re both rife with witty Victorian English, as might be expected.  The first, “Rosalind,” is a delightful romp, addressing Barriesque explorations of “ever-youth,” but from a completely different angle than “Peter Pan.”  I was lucky to catch the director, Dana Dewes, filling in for the leading lady Saturday night.  She brilliantly met the challenge of the role of Mrs. Page, who goes through a remarkable transformation in this compact one-act. Like “Peter Pan,” the story is a stretch for the imagination, but with such supple writing and remarkable performances, disbelief is suspendible.  Kevin Railsback is charming as the handsome, baffled swain and at one point does a pantomime of frustration that is quite fun to see play out.

Nick Santiago, the set designer, did a bang-up job of changing the different worlds of these plays with a whirling backdrop that could have been made into a show in itself.

But it is “The Old Lady Shows her Medals” that holds the tearjerker cards. Penny Safranek and Joe McGovern turn in ace performances in a story of the glory of human desire to create and maintain human relationships.  Ms. Safranek is gamine and graceful as she comically displays her contrition and affection for a young Scottish soldier. Actor McGovern does the soldier to a T. He runs the gamut from macho bravado to … well, you’ve got to see it.

One thing about going to Pacific Resident, besides the sheer convenience of world-class theatre right here on Oakwood and Venice, is that returning to catch another play, you’re likely to see that actor who knocked you out two months ago doing something completely different, with a different hair color! It’s just so damn rewarding.

“ROSALIND” and ”THE OLD LADY SHOWS HER MEDALS” by J.M. Barrie

Directed by Marilyn Fox and Dana Dewes

Through October 2011

For reservations, call 310-822-8392