Adapted by Maxwell Anderson from the novel by William March, Bad Seed takes place in a small southern town in the late spring of 1955. The Penmarks appear to be the perfect family. Gracious Christine is loving wife to handsome Kenneth and is a devoted mother to sweet Rhoda. Neighbors Monica and Emory are charmed by the family, but others have concerns about Rhoda. Could this delightful little girl have a darker side? 
 
The Bad Seed cast is: Anthony Berg of Addison as Emory Wages; Marea Berkley Clement of Aurora as Mrs. Daigle; Pat Daly of Naperville as Mr. Daigle; Cesar Gonzales of Glendale Heights as Kenneth Penmark; Rod Kelly of Lombard as Reginald Tasker; Hannah Klose of Naperville as Rhoda Penmark; Kristin K. Morris of Chicago as Monica Breedlove; Jennifer Myers of Glen Ellyn as Miss Fern; Amy Royle of Downers Grove as Christine Penmark; Jack Smith of Bloomingdale as Leroy; Jim Van de Velde of Villa Park as Richard Bravo.
 
Jeni Dees (South Elgin) is directing, assisted by Jo-Ann Ledger (Bolingbrook). Ben Aylesworth (Bolingbrook) is the production manager and master carpenter. Bruce Ebner (Batavia) is the stage manager, and Amy Johnson (Lombard) is the assistant stage manager.
 
Additional production staff include: Tracy L. Adams (properties); Dave Amato (sound design); Ken Beach (production photography); Traci A. Cidlik (graphic design); Jeni Dees (hair and make-up); Mary Engle and Berni Raymond (set decoration); Craig Gustafson (Starboard design); Susan Hajny (costume design); Melissa Heischberg (website); Jo-Ann Ledger (publicity); Steven Merkel (publicity photography and gun wrangler); Rebecca Poole (tickets); Kate Quan (programme); Steve Schroeder (front of house); Jim Van de Velde (lighting design).
 
For full crew lists, special acknowledgements and ticket information,  please visit the Bad Seed page at http://www.wheatondrama.org.
 
Performances of Bad Seed are January 27 through February 19. Shows are Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm and Sundays at 3pm. Tickets are $13 each for Thursdays, $16 each Fridays – Sundays. Bad Seed is licensed by Dramatists Play Service, Inc.

Therefore, I am officially taking a break from reviewing.  I hope to come back to it towards the end of February, but right now I have far too much on my plate.

Thank you to everyone for your support up to this point.  I can’t even begin to describe how much I have enjoyed getting to see so many wonderful people and performances in the last 2 years.  I look forward to seeing more of you all in the New Year.

Happy Thanksgiving, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.  May you have brilliant productions and full houses!!

xx

In Jean-Paul Sartre’s 1944 classic, No Exit, “Hell is other people”.  There may be redemption, there may not be, but each of the other people in the room will torment you in some way.  They will come to know your sins, they will be the ones to pass judgement on you and they will be the ones to continuously re-open the wounds of your conscience.  While an intriguing concept, and one that I’ve thought a lot about after seeing the show, the script is not the best.  Translations are hard to begin with and while I believe this is the standard one (Paul Bowles) it doesn’t flow as well as I’d like and I think there are quite a few nuances lost.  However, even with that, Sartre’s existentialism comes out strongly and leaves the audience pondering several questions about the hereafter.

I saw the Albright Theatre’s production a couple of weeks ago and I am just now able to find time to write.  Sadly this production closes this evening, so if you are wanting to see it, go right now.  Get out to Batavia for the final performance and then come back to read this review later.  I am again finding myself in the position of apologizing for the tardiness of this review, but I will discuss that a bit more in another post.

I’m going to keep this fairly short and sweet.  While I enjoyed the show and found myself thinking quite a bit about the interpretation of Hell, there were a few things about the production I wasn’t convinced by.  Inez (Erica Paszkowski) was a strong character and well defined, however I would have liked to see a less obvious choice made in the portrayal of the “angry lesbian”.  Costuming was too severe and too stereotypical.  I think a softer touch to Inez would have made her all the more torturous as a personality.

Cradeau (Frank Warpeha) thinks he is a man’s man: he enjoys his love conquests, terrorizing his wife, and appearing to risk his life for his profession.  He is in reality a coward.  Warpeha did a good job of showing his macho side, it was his more vulnerable side that I wanted a better glimpse at.  More insight into the internal struggle he was fighting, not just the external symptoms of it.

Estelle (Lisa Savegnago) is the well-to-do society lady who married for money and decided to take a younger lover to make herself happy.  Always gorgeous and a definite presence on stage, Savengnago was the strongest actor of the evening.  Her choices were more real and the performance slightly more polished.  However, I did feel that she played the role too young.  For me, it would have worked better if she was more snobbish, proper, and reserved in her portrayal.

No Exit also suffered a bit from the lack of a crescendo.  Bursts of anger came from nowhere and felt as though the director told the actors to “be angry now”.  The characters were far too comfortable too quickly with each other when introduced in the room as well.  More suspicion was needed.  More discomfort.  Gradually we needed to build to the point of realization that “Hell is other people” and that ultimately we are responsible for our own eternity.  By the time we came to the climax in the second act, the tension and anger had stayed at one level for too long for the audience to fully appreciate the struggle of the decision.

Overall, it’s a well-rehearsed, polished production that I hope has had a great run.  I loved the philosophical questions and enjoyed thinking about the consequences each person now has to “live” with.  And if you can still make it this evening, go support a great theatre company.

No Exit is presented by the Albright Theatre in downtown Batavia and runs through November 19.  Tickets and information can be found on their website here.

Saturday evening of opening weekend for the Albright Theatre’s latest production was sparsely attended, which is really too bad. This is a great company and I would really like to see their houses a bit more full. As it was, though, the audience that was there seemed to thoroughly enjoy their evening. I also want to mention that I liked the recent addition of the light booth/concession stand/box office they have built. It was something they needed and I think they’ve done it well.

Eat Your Heart Out opens with Charlie (JP Quirk) preparing the tables at the first restaurant in which we see him working. Quirk looks the part and has an easy manner about him. Unfortunately he speaks a little too fast and was rushing many of his lines. He’s a good actor with some great instincts, but occasionally missed the nuances and comedy of a line due to his rapid delivery. I wanted him to take more time to think about what he was saying and make it more real to himself. There were some moments he could have made great if he’d taken the time to think, and show us his thinking, before reciting the lines.

The Girls were portrayed by Anika Bryceson. Very pretty and fantastic looking on stage, Bryceson was the picture of innocence…maybe even a little too innocent. I wanted more sexual tension between her first character and Charlie, not just shy awkwardness, especially in the opening scene. There needed to be more pull between them to establish the emotional conflict in the plot. There’s not a lot to the overarching story and the attraction between them needed to be stronger to make the plot believable.

Taryn Hettlinger Parise played The Women. She was funny and endearing in each reincarnation. It takes a very talented actor to distinguish each individual role and keep them interesting. Once again, I felt there were some nuances to the script missing, but overall I thought she did a great job.

Tony Parise and Terrell Riggins also played multiple roles as The Men and The Boys, respectively. I thought both did a fine job. If I were to make any suggestions to them, though, it would be to work on the subtlety of their deliveries. The Albright is a small space and doesn’t need too much “big” acting to get the point across. I think they could both pull back a bit and still be very effective in their roles.

I have to say, though, my favorite person of the evening was Aidan Descourouez as The Bus Boy. Silent throughout, he had great facial expressions and body language. I saw more thought in his mute portrayal than I saw in several of the more seasoned actors. And while it may have gone on just a little too long, his dance sequence was great fun and broke up the action just enough for the break the audience needed at that point.

On the tech side of things, it was pretty straight forward. There was a one point where the backstage folks seemed to be making too much noise and I was wondering what was going on, when I suddenly realized they were meant to be the background din! While I appreciated the authenticity of the sound, it wasn’t quite enough to be “din” and therefore not recognizable as a sound effect. There needs to be more of it and more constant to be truly effective.

Set design was very minimal, which normally I like. However, in this case, I would have liked to see more shift between the restaurants than just the table clothes. Perhaps some paintings or photos that could be flipped around. Or restaurant names that could be easily changed. It wasn’t hard to follow the changes as they were, but the clothes didn’t give me enough recognition of the each scene to remember what had transpired in that restaurant previously. I needed more visual cues.

For me, the number one thing I wanted to change, though, was the overall timing of delivery. Quirk was not the only person to rush his lines. At several point I wanted to stop everyone on stage to tell them to slow down and breathe. And not just breathe, but to think about what they were saying. Enunciation was lost, punch lines glossed over, laughs stepped on because it felt as though everyone was racing to the end. It also meant there was no emotional build, as I mentioned earlier. The entire play stayed at one emotional level, regardless of whether we were happy about a prospective role or frustrated over not providing for our family.

Eat Your Heart Out is an entertaining show with lots of laughs for everyone, especially those of us who know what waiting tables while hoping for our big break is like! There are so many things we can relate to, and so many things that are funny because they’re true. The Albright is doing a fine job of this show, there just some things they could be doing to make it great. Get out there to Batavia and see it. It’s a great group of people to support.

Eat Your Heart Out is presentedby The Albright Theatre in downtown Batavia and runs through September 24, 2011. For tickets and information go to their website here.

First I must apologize again for the tardiness of this review.  Labor Day weekend blended into a new school week and somehow I completely forgot that I hadn’t done this one yet!  I had every intention of having this up early last week, but clearly it wasn’t in the cards.  My apologies to the Riverfront Playhouse.

Mass Appeal has a huge cast of only two.  Nothing is hidden when working with such a small cast; no one can blend into the background and every nuance needs to be pretty spot on for the script to work.  I will say that this is an interesting script, still not sure I like it, but definitely interesting and thought provoking.  I think part of my problem with it, though, is that director Tim Curtis didn’t quite get all of the comedy that was possible with it.  It’s a tough balance with this play.  The possibility is there to have the audience laughing the entire time, but to do so would take away the earnestness of the message it is trying to send.  Unfortunately, I don’t think the Riverfront Playhouse manage to hit enough of the laughs to balance it the other way.

Mark Dolson (Frank Warpeha) is the firebrand seminarian who challenges Father Tim to be more aggressive in saving his flock.  Warpeha played the role more angry than passionate, and for me it didn’t quite hit the mark.  I wanted to see more build towards the final outburst, but because he was so angry throughout the play I didn’t really feel the emotional effect in that final scene.  I also wanted Warpeha to connect with the audience more.  He was utterly focused on Father Tim the entire time, which meant you felt a little like you were intruding on the conversations rather than being a part of them.  Warpeha doesn’t look directly at the audience, doesn’t show us what he is contemplating, doesn’t give us a chance to react to his emotions, and therefore we feel a slight disconnect to him and his character.

Father Tim Farley (Gary Puckett) on the other hand was exactly what I imagine the complacent, charismatic priest to be like.  His sermons were delivered with an ease and conviviality that spoke to just what a crowd-pleaser Father Tim is.  I loved Puckett’s sense of humor and the general good-natured attitude.  I felt as though I were genuinely a part of his congregation while he was preaching and believed him as he broke down towards the end and shared his difficulties of his youth.  For me, Puckett gave a fantastic performance.

There were a few minor issues that could have been done differently.  For example, director Tim Curtis and I discussed the length of the scene changes.  They were a little on the long side, but it was due to the authenticity of the priests’ vestments.  They looked great and I agree with keeping them authentic, but it did mean the costume changes were quite involved.  In general, though, the tech side of things looked good.  I loved the pulpit with the flower arrangements on either side.  Lighting worked well, the sound effects were not jarring but believable, and the set was minimal but effective.

It’s been a while since I’ve said this, but it’s very true in this instance:  The biggest change that needed to happen was that they needed a larger audience to react to the punchlines and feel the emotions of the more poignant scenes.  It’s a good show with a lot laughs.  I recommend getting out to Aurora to see it.

Mass Appeal is presented by The Riverfront Playhouse in downtown Aurora and runs through October 1, 2011.  For tickets and information, visit their website here.

When Dr. Jekyll’s experiment goes horribly wrong, an entire new personality is created and a monster is released on the streets of London.  While not exactly true to the original story by Robert Louis Stevenson, Jekyll and Hyde, The Musical is a wonderfully romantic and at times thought provoking script with fantastic songs, especially for all of us mezzos out here!

Friday evening I had the opportunity to see Joliet Drama Guild’s latest production of Jekyll and Hyde, The Musical.  Now, I gotta tell you that this musical holds a very dear place in my heart.  It was my first musical back on stage after 10 years of not performing.  And it was the first musical I did in London, as well.  It’s not Sondheim, but I really love this show and have loads of fond memories of doing it.  It’s never easy to put aside your own perceptions and memories of a show to see another group perform it, but I was excited to reacquaint myself with Jekyll, Lucy and Emma!

First thing I noticed was the laboratory on stage left.  It was a great set up with the lab table, beakers, tubes and colorful lighting.  The brick backdrop was a nice addition and felt like a basement lab.  I’m not sure I was completely sold on the neon lighting under some of the tubes, I think I would have preferred white lighting through colored water, but overall I thought the effect of the mad scientist’s lab was achieved.

I also quite liked the London street scene backdrop.  Though not geographically accurate, it also set the scene well, leaving no doubt of where the story was taking place.

On the actor side of things there were a couple of performances that stood out from the rest.  Utterson (Justin Ongenae) was empathetic and charismatic as Jekyll’s best friend and lawyer.  He had a fairly strong singing voice and looked the role.

Emma Carew (Shanan D’Agostino) was another bright light of the evening.  A beautiful soprano voice, she sang her songs with ease.   D’Agostino has a good stage presence and tried make the connections needed with the other actors to make the story believable.  Unfortunately, her beautiful operatic voice got in the way of the songs a bit.  These songs need a little more belt to them than D’Agostino gave them.  This wasn’t an awful thing when she was singing solo, the problem came when she was singing with another actor on stage.  Her operatic quality did not blend with the other singers.  Her voice stood out amongst the crowd, but not in good way.

For me, the best performance of the evening came from Lucy Harris (Jeannie Rega-Markionni).  With strong belt vocals, Rega-Markionni was committed to her character and infused her songs with the emotions needed to convey Lucy’s story.  Rega-Markionni made choices in her performance that I didn’t see happening with other people on stage.  She stayed in the moment and worked to bring Lucy to life.  And I’ve got to give her props for some excellent timing during the song Dangerous Game.  JDG used pre-recorded music and as is often the case when this happens, it’s hard for the singers to match the tempo of the recording, especially once the adrenaline of a live performance sets in.  Rega-Markionni was fairly consistent through out the show of hitting those tempos, but it was spot on during Dangerous Game and sounded brilliant.  Well done.

Michael J. Perkins played the title role of Jekyll/Hyde.  Unfortunately I think there may be some problems with the monitor situation on stage because I often felt like he couldn’t hear the music clearly enough.  Too often his singing sat just below the pitch.  His posture and vocal changes were well developed and distinct in each character, but it was lacking a more visual change.  He needed to be wigged and use the same technique the Broadway production did to differentiate the two characters.  It would have helped.

There were, unfortunately, a number of directorial problems with this production.  Blocking tended to be awkward and unnatural.  The scene in which Jekyll is trying to convince the Board of Governors to let him experiment on humans is a prime example.  Jekyll stood with his back to half of the audience for almost the entirety of the scene.  There are ways to move him about the stage, turning him in different directions, without losing where his focus is.  Other times, in a monologue or solo scene, the actors seemed to wander lost across the stage, as though they were told to kill time through this part.

There was also a pretty severe lack of character development throughout the cast.  There were many instances where the lines felt as though they were being read and not said with an actual purpose.  I go back to what I said last week about letting the character “speak” and “do” because that’s what the character needs, not because it is written in the script that way.  Every person on stage needs to develop their own story.  I know it sounds like Theater 101, but too often we depend on the lines to tell us what to do when in reality we need to let our characters tell us what to do.

Choreography was another problem within this production.  It was pedantic and predictable, using far too many hand movements to act out each individual word.  There was a glimmer of hope during Bring On The Men, but not enough space on the stage to realize the full effect.  I would also caution against using young junior high aged girls in the bar room scene.  I’m not sure that’s a great way to demonstrate what is going on in the Red Rat.

Finally, I want to remind the cast of my standard advice to anyone who finds themselves on stage.  I call it Amy’s Rule Of Paranoia and I’ve shared it with you before:  Someone is ALWAYS watching you when you are onstage.  Regardless of whether you are the center of attention or not, someone in the audience is watching you.  You can’t, for one second, let your guard down and think that no one sees you giggle with the person next to you or no one noticed you scratching yourself, fixing your hair, rubbing your nose, etc.  Stay in character and stay in the scene.  It helps us, the audience, to suspend belief and enjoy the show.

There is no doubt that this has been a production of love for all the cast and crew, and everyone has obviously worked very hard.  Unfortunately, it’s just not quite up to the same standard I’ve seen in other musicals around the area.  Having said that, this really is one of my favorite shows of all time and it’s worth the trip down to Joliet to hear the music.  And to hear Jeannie Rega-Markionni sing Dangerous Game and A New Life, truly a wonderful performance.

Jekyll and Hyde, The Musical is presented by Joliet Drama Guild in downtown Joliet and runs through August 18, 2011.  For tickets and information, visit their website here.

It’s this empathy and love we have for Charlie Brown and all the Peanuts Gang that kept us reading the comic strip, watching the seasonal specials and buying the lunch box for all these years.  The musical, You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown, is no different.  Like Seussical, it brings to life some of our most cherished childhood characters and gives them time to win our hearts all over again.

Director Craig Gustafson has put together a cast made up of some of my favorite people, both personally and theatrically.  This is my disclaimer, folks.  Yep, I’m pretty good friends with half the cast and the director.  However, I will strive to give you an honest and balanced review, just as I always do.

And now that that’s out of the way, let’s get to the review.

There’s no question that there are some extraordinary performers on the stage for Charlie Brown.  Zach Gibson’s portrayal of Schroeder is energetic and child-like.  He’s fun to watch and you just can’t help laughing at/with him.  Gibson’s facial expressions alone can keep you entertained for the evening.  Add to that a great singing voice and Gibson becomes one the favorites on stage.

Another favorite has to be Stuart Vance in the title role of Charlie Brown.  Also very child-like, Vance plays the bewildered Charlie Brown with a great empathy for our favorite loser.  From admitting all of his faults in The Doctor Is In to explaining how he lost the ball game in T-E-A-M, we felt that amused sympathy for poor Charlie Brown.  Vance keeps us hoping that something good will finally happen for him.

However, hands down, the best actor on stage was Lisa Dawn Foertsch as Snoopy.  I’ve already pointed out how Charlie Brown is like Seussical, and as I said in that review, just because they are silly or imaginary characters, doesn’t mean we can’t play them real.  And that is precisely what Foertsch did with Snoopy.  I never once questioned who her character was; she just became the sarcastic, fun-loving, adventurous beagle I remember from all the comic strips and TV specials.  She didn’t chase a rabbit around the doghouse because the director told her to, Snoopy chased the rabbit for Patty’s benefit.  She didn’t languish over the lack of supper in her bowl because that’s what the script says, Snoopy was really panicking and over-reacting to Charlie Brown’s “forgetfulness”.  I must say that I thought Foertsch was one of the best performers I’ve seen out here in our community theater world.  Well done.

There were some great song performances as well that I would like to point out.  The Book Report and Glee Club Rehearsal were both done almost to perfection.  Balance was excellent, each singer blending well, and yet bringing out his or her part appropriately at various points.  And speaking of great musical performances, I must mention the pit band.  For a while I wasn’t sure whether they were pre-recorded or live due to how well they were playing the score.

As always, there were some things I would have liked to see done differently.  I really have to go back to the idea of playing these characters “real”.  Too often I felt like the actors were just pretending to be children rather than actually becoming the child.  It’s a fine line, and easier said than done, but I really wanted to see a bit more authenticity in the acting.

I also have to say that as much as I love to hear Genevieve Pastore (Lucy) sing, I once again did not care for what I’m sure was a clear direction given by Gustafson.  Pastore spent the entire evening “mugging” and over-exaggerating every facial expression to try and capture the essence of Lucy.  I just don’t like it.  I didn’t believe any of it.  Again, it pushed the performance too far into caricature rather than character for me.

Unfortunately Friday evening the tech side of things was a bit of a nightmare.  I understand that the lighting board crashed Friday morning and that the light operator was kinda doing things from memory Friday evening.  And, of course, that meant there were a few interesting cues – either missed or added – that the cast didn’t expect or that just didn’t work.  All of which is unfortunate, but a consequence of live theater.  We do our best with the situation we have.  However, what I could decipher of the lighting design I wasn’t sold on.  For one thing I really felt there were too many blackouts.  I know the script calls for quite a few, but I would rather see the lights go down on one side of the stage where a scene has just ended, while simultaneously coming up on the other side where a new scene is starting.  Or variations on this instead of the action-stopping blackout. For another, I just didn’t feel the stage was lit well when the lights were up.  Too often we just plain couldn’t see the actors.

There were also some sound problems.  At the start of the show the mics weren’t turned up enough, or there weren’t enough of them, but the balance was off and the singers were being over-powered by the band.  By the start of the second act, the mics were too hot and ringing throughout Snoopy’s pursuit of the Red Baron.  I’m not sure if the sound board was also experiencing technical difficulties, but if not then these were things that should have been sorted out before opening night.

Overall, this is another great show for the whole family.  While the adults are reminiscing about their favorite Peanuts character or storyline, the kids will be laughing at jokes and onstage antics.  And this is a show that definitely needs an audience. Get out to Lisle and support them.

You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown is presented by Players, Please Theatre at Trinity Lutheran Church Green Trails in Lisle and runs through August 28,2011.  For tickets and information, go to their website.

Sunday afternoon my daughter and I had the pleasure of seeing Seussical the Musical in Des Plaines. The Footlighters Theatre Company, I believe, is sponsored by the Des Plaines Park District. As such, they used a lot of young talent in their production. I always enjoy children participating in theater; I want them to discover the same love for it that I have. This was clearly a well-rehearsed and well-organized production that I’m sure every parent found to be a positive experience for their child. And there was a lot to enjoy as an audience member, too.

The first thing I really noticed was the pit band. Great sound and energy, they looked like they were also enjoying the performance. Many times we don’t get to actually see the band and I enjoyed their positioning in the theater. It’s nice to have the band outside of the pit!

Costuming for this production was spot on. Costumers Danielle Soldat and Joellen Flener, along with their crew, managed to capture the very essence of Dr. Seuss with bright colors, outrageous wigs, strategically placed hula hoops and lots of feathers! Well done.

There were several outstanding performances, but having limited time again, I can only touch on a few. Mayzie La Bird (Desiree Gonzolez) and Gertrude McFuzz (Lauren Hagan) had fantastic voices and hearing their songs was a pleasure. I’m not sure which Jojo I got to see (Katherine Smail or Katherine Parker) but she also had a great voice and knew her role perfectly. The Cat in the Hat (Peter Sisto) was funny and playful, just what you want from The Cat.

The star of the show, though, was most definitely Horton the Elephant (Kent Joseph). An amazing singer and actor, I looked forward to every single time he was on stage. From “Horton Hears a Who” to “Solla Sollew” each song was sung with an emotional connection that I was missing from the rest of the cast. Joseph’s bio states that he has been involved in a good number of productions that were nominated for Jeff awards. It shows. Hands down, one of the best performers I’ve seen on the community theater stage.

Were there things that could’ve been done differently? Well, yes. Of course there were. The most important one for me, though, was the emotional connection to the show. Seussical is a silly musical, no question. However, that does not mean that the characters can’t be “real”. The lack of development across the board suggests that the rehearsal process focused almost exclusively on memorizing, blocking, and dancing (which are all obviously very important) and didn’t leave a lot of time to figure out exactly why Mayzie felt the way she did about her egg. Or just why Gertude loved Horton so much. Or even just how worried the Whos are about their tiny little world. These connections are what make a good production excellent.

The other important part that I felt needed some work was the pacing. The show just didn’t move as quickly or as succinctly as I wanted. As I said, this was a very well-rehearsed performance and there weren’t the physical issues that can mess with the pacing, such as traffic patterns or forgotten placements. It was more an overall lack of energy and (again) emotion that slowed the forward movement of the show.

Generally speaking, this is a production that everyone involved with should be proud of, but to be a brilliant one it needed to be taken to the next level of development. Having said that, the kids were cute, the adults were super talented, the set interesting, the costumes bright and fun, almost everything you want from Dr. Seuss on stage. Get up to Des Plaines and check it out. And take the kids. My daughter thought it was fantastic and smiled the whole way through. Speaking of whom, she wanted me to tell you her favorite parts were the General (Bud Jones) giving the opening announcement and the surprise at the very end. She’s still talking about the surprise at the end! Clearly, she’s a seven year old girl!

For photos of the show, go here.

Seussical the Musical is presented by Footlighters Theatre Company at Prairie Lakes Theater in Des Plaines and runs through August 7. For tickets and information, go to www.dpparks.org.

Saturday evening saw my return to Batavia to see The Albright Theatre’s final show of the season.  With lots of twists and turns in the story, An Act of the Imagination certainly keeps you on your toes.  I enjoyed the show, but I’m not sure I liked it.  Bernard Slade is best known for Same Time, Next Year and his writing credits on several popular sitcoms.  However, I don’t think this script ranks amongst the top of his writings.  I just kept getting the feeling that Mr. Slade was trying too hard to be tricky and clever.

In regards to the Albright’s production, there were several things that were really good.  First off, I loved the set design (JP Quirk).  Warm, rich colors, elegantly furnished, great French windows in the back, I knew before opening the program that we were going to be sitting in an English drawing room all evening.

Costumes (Julie Moss, Veronica Krystal), particularly for the women, were very well done.  Julia’s (Jana Sanders) dresses were spot-on perfect for the time.  I loved the black dress and jacket towards the end.  Totally Jackie Kennedy.  And Brenda’s (Veronica Krystal) dress was just plain fun.

As for my favorite performances, I really need to talk about two of the women.  Jana Sanders is a strong actress with pretty good timing.  There was a little warming up necessary, but once she was into it, she was great.  While the two men (Ron Gustin as Arthur and Thom Will as Simon) acting opposite her also gave good performances, Sanders was the one who continuously drew your attention.  She had a pretty good handle on the British way of delivering the dry punchlines.  It’s not an easy thing to accomplish, they have such a way of saying little asides that one may not even realize it was a joke until sometime later.  Sanders got this and was able to carry it off fairly well.

The actress I just loved was barely on stage!  Erica Paszkowski enters near the end as Brooke Carmichael and gives a performance so effortlessly and natural that…well, I can’t really finish my thought without a spoiler warning.  Suffice it to say, even with the limited stage time, she was my favorite of the evening.

As always, there were a few things I may have done differently.  First of all, I can’t say it enough:  If you are going to do a show based in London (or any other major world city for that matter) you need to do your research and make sure you are pronouncing the landmark names correctly.  It’s not like Welsh, which is spoken briefly during the play.  There are approximately 3 million people in the world who speak Welsh fluently.  The likelihood that one of them is sitting in an audience in the far-western suburbs of Chicago is pretty low.  15 million people from around the world visit London every year.  There is a significantly higher chance that one (or more) of them is sitting in your audience.  So please, I beg you, learn to Leicester Square correctly.  It sounds like Lester.  And the famous place where Eliza Doolittle was selling flowers is CUH-vent Garden with a short “u” sound, not COH-vent Garden with a long “o”.  For more on this same topic, refer back to this earlier review.

I would also offer a word of caution regarding the accents.  For the most part I was well-impressed with the British accents.  However, I’m not sure if fatigue set in or maybe the last couple of scenes hadn’t been rehearsed as much, but near the end of the show the accents began to fade and get muddled.  Just beware that it’s happening and it will fix itself.

Direction (Sherry Poulos) for this production wasn’t quite as strong as I’ve seen at the Albright.  Pacing was a bit slow,  blackouts weren’t terrible but weren’t done as quickly as I’d like to see, and at times I felt the actors were a little lost on stage.  Too often they were just walking back and forth without a real purpose to their movement.  And when they did need to move to a new spot it tended to feel contrived.   I think the direction has a solid start, but hasn’t quite reached that fluid, easy execution yet.

I guess I’ve got to say I’m a bit “eh” on this one.  Again, this is a great theatre group with wonderful people and loads of hard work has gone into this.  If you are in the area, then I encourage you to get over to the Albright to see it.  They, too, deserve to be supported and certainly could have used a larger audience.  However, it may not be the show I would recommend a special trip out to Batavia to see.  The script itself is just okay and although there were some wonderful portrayals, I’m not sure they are enough to overcome the script.

An Act of the Imagination is presented by the Albright Theatre in downtown Batavia and runs through May 21.  For more information and to buy tickets visit their website here.

Sunday was my first visit to the GreenMan Theatre in Elmhurst.  They are a small company on a tight budget and their performances take place in multipurpose room of the First United Methodist Church of Elmhurst.  It’s a very small space, but I must say they use it fairly efficiently.  It’s a difficult situation for them, I sure.  They currently have to rent the stage lights for every production and until quite recently they had to share their space with another group during the week.  I would imagine that meant not only having to somehow clear away their sets each Sunday, but then get them back in place for Friday evening.  And because of that, I’m sure they have to keep their sets very minimal.

Acting-wise there were some good things happening on the stage.  Katie Monahan as Olivia Darnell was a calming presence in the midst of so much other (intentional) chaos.  While Monahan could throw herself into the fray when necessary, most of her portrayal was understated and comfortable.  Olivia has a tendency to run-on when she’s nervous and Monahan had it down perfectly to every nuance.

Will Hays is the overbearing and pompous censor determined to see that the “right” thing is done on behalf of the public.  Or at the very least make sure that everyone understands how important he is.  Steve Schroeder just about nailed this part.  Occasionally he may have been “chewing the scenery”, but for the most part his comic timings were perfect, facial expressions hilarious and his character well-developed.

Of course, where would this show be without Max Reinhardt himself.  Using a pretty darn good German/Austrian accent, Rob Reinalda’s portrayal of Reinhardt was not only believable, but awfully close to effortless.  Capable of delivering punchlines with dry, deadpan humor while appearing to be completely self-deprecating, Reinalda kept my attention each time he was on the stage.  I particularly enjoyed the scene where Hays and Reinhardt confront each other.  The onstage chemistry and trust between them was wonderful.

As usual, I did have a few things I would have changed.  Returning to the set discussion, while the space was fairly well used, the backdrop was not as good as I wanted it to be.  My first impression upon sitting in my seat was that we were suddenly in the school auditorium waiting for the Jr. High show to begin.  Now, I’m not an artist and I certainly could not have painted the backdrop anywhere near as well as the GreenMan did.  However, when dealing with a show that demands you believe in the fantastic, you’re backdrop needs to be able to transport you to those places.  Or maybe find a more abstract representation. So much hard work deserves to be performed in a space that compliments it.

The very opening scene involves a parade of stars, each actor dressing up several times and making their way around the entire audience to give the appearance of a red carpet event.  While I liked the idea, in reality it went on far too long.  Only a few movie stars were really needed to give us the right impression, after that it was just a little too chaotic and not believable.  Unfortunately, it doesn’t set a very good vibe for the opening of a show.

Another concern I had was that the offstage mic was picking up the sound of pages being turned.  I believe this was the mic used for sound effects, and that whoever was in charge of them was following along in their script.  Not a huge deal, but it was distracting and I was constantly reminding myself to “pay no attention to the [person] behind the curtain”.

Pacing was a little rough, too.  Some of the comedy got lost in the rush, while some of got lost in the delivery.  Ken Ludwig is an incredibly witty guy.  It doesn’t take a lot of slapstick to make him funny, but at times I felt we were compromising on the quality of the line to get in another physical “bit”.  Plus the blackouts.  Once again I found myself counting them and wondering how long before the nights come up.

One last thing I wanted to see done a bit differently was how to distinguish Oberon and Puck from the rest of the movie actors.  I think the easiest way would have been to give them each a British accent or some other differentiating trait, but definitely something that made them more unique.  Even with the fog machine, it took me a bit to figure out that they were meant to be magical and not mere mortals on the set.  Though having said that, I did watch a few clips of Reinhardt’s original movie this week and I wanted to say how impressed I was with the GreenMan’s attempt to replicate Oberon’s and Puck’s costumes.  They were about as close as you could get.

Shakespeare in Hollywood is a great script and a fun show.  And the GreenMan Theatre is a lovely group of people doing some nice work.  Definitely a theater worth supporting so get out to Elmhurst and see it.

Shakespeare in Hollywood is presented by the GreenMan Theatre in downtown Elmhurst and runs through May 22.  For tickets and more info visit their website here.