BERKSHIRE ON STAGE

June 24, 2019

REVIEW: “The Fantasticks” At Silverthorne Theater/

by Jenny Hansell

Don’t gore my ox, and I won’t gore yours. If I criticize the musical The Fantasticks, you may react with as much hostility as I did when I read the recent takedown of Hamilton in The Nation, in which the writer accused Lin-Manuel Miranda of glossing over the founding fathers’ slave ownership, and took swipes at his lyrics at the same time. Really?

I managed to miss seeing The Fantasticks in its original 40-year off Broadway run and nine-year revival, nor did I grow up with the cast album, so this was my first encounter with it. I wasn’t wowed by it but can appreciate why it’s so loved, so often performed, and why so many in the audience at the Silverthorne Theater in Greenfield were smiling and bobbing to songs they clearly knew by heart, performed by a strong and appealing cast.

On mostly bare stage, set only with a platform, a ladder and a trunk or two, a Girl and a Boy have fallen in love, despite a feud between their parents.  Only their parents (usually fathers but here played by women) are not feuding – they are in cahoots, conspiring to get their children together by telling them they must not.  I capitalized Girl and Boy because all the characters are clearly classic types in the commedia dell’arte manner, used to both tell the story and comment on its absurdity at the same time.

The host of the evening, played with a warm twinkle and firm baritone voice by Larry Picard, sets the scene, offers some commentary, and starts things off with the song that became the best-known standard from the score, Try to Remember.  Though on the surface, it’s sweetly nostalgic, the song warns you not to take the initial love story at face value and to beware the complexities to come: without a hurt the heart is hollow. 

Jasmine Goodspeed and Larry Picard. Photo Ellen Blanchette.

As Luisa, Jasmine Goodspeed has a sweet voice and effectively finds the needy, wanting side of a girl who wants to be special, not ordinary.  Andy Zane is charming if a bit bland as Matt, the Boy, and his voice is strong and appealing. She looks like a young Mayim Bialik; his blond hair and and eager innocence bring to mind Cary Elwes in The Princess Bride.  Autumn Tustin and Stephanie Carlson as Bellamy and Hucklebee worked hard to bring out the comedic elements – perhaps too hard. It wasn’t until John Reese as an ageing Shakespearean actor, and and David Cavallin, his jester-like sidekick, emerged from an old trunk that the wit of the script felt natural, not overdone.  Their more relaxed, yet utterly absurd, shtick made me forget — almost forget — that their characters exist to stage a “rape” – here, an abduction, not sexual violence, but the word is repeated multiple times, gratingly. I wonder how it struck theatergoers in 1960, but today it just – doesn’t work.

The jazz-inflected music was ably provided by Ted Trobaugh on piano, and the lively fight choreography, involving colorfully painted wooden swords and many amusingly theatrical stabbings, was by John Iverson.

Act One’s happy ending is a red herring – the lovers must be “burnt and burnished by the sun,” and seek further, not always pleasant, adventures apart, before (spoiler alert) finding their way back to each other in the end.  The cast brings it home with energy and commitment.

The Fantasticks, presented by Silverthorne Theater Company June 20-29, 2019, Hawks & Reed Performing Arts Center, 289 Main Street in Greenfield MA. Music by Harvey Schmidt. Lyrics by Tom Jones. Directed by Carmela Lanza-Weil. Music Direction by Ted Trobaugh. https://silverthornetheater.org/

El Gallo: Larry Picard; Luisa: Jasmine Goodspeed; Matt: Andy Zane; Bellamy: Autumn Tustin; Hucklebee: Stephanie Carlson; The Mute: Madeleine Bolles Oldenberg; Henry (The Old Actor): John Reese; Mortimer: David Cavallin.

Producer: Rebecca Daniels; Technical Director: John Iverson; Stage Manager: Sharon Weyers; Set Designer: Hannah Trobaugh; Costumer: Jazmine Carroll; Choreographer: Molly Fletcher Lynch: Fight choreographer: John Iverson; Master Carpenter: Cole Payne.

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 From the Valley Advocate

Silverthorne Theater Company, the Valley’s newest and most adventurous summer troupe, held a new-play competition last winter. Out of over 400 nationwide entries, Aidan’s Gift, by Kentuckian Elizabeth Orndorff, was the unanimous winner.

I say “adventurous” because this fledgling Equity company, now in its second year, has from the start reached for the unusual and risky. Last year’s inaugural season included Bertolt Brecht’s political fable The Caucasian Chalk Circle, and this year’s three-play program comprises a modern parable, an interethnic love story and, playing through this weekend at Silverthorne’s new, more accessible home in Greenfield, a world premiere.

It’s an imperfect but utterly compelling drama – imperfect because the ending doesn’t quite convince and there are a few missed plotting opportunities; compelling because it wrestles with large questions of faith, loss, vocation, pride and forgiveness in a lively and literate manner and centers on a fascinating, exasperating title character. That’s Father Aidan, a rather ornery Benedictine monk who has lost his faith and retreated into a bitter shell defended with self-loathing and biting humor.

Ten years ago, we learn, one of the novices under his tutelage left the monastery and the calling, and something about it has been eating at him ever since. The Abbot, finally fed up with Aidan’s belligerent isolation, assigns another young novice to his care, in hopes the challenge will pull him out of his self-imposed Slough of Despond. Aidan, who is stubbornly but wittily defensive, parries every helping hand that’s offered. (“That is a load of – forgive me, Father, for I am about to sin – bullshit.”)

The young man assigned to him – as penance or salvation? – is John Mark, who has transferred from another monastery (tellingly named Gethsemane) for mysterious reasons. Both Aidan and the monastic community are quickly entranced by the newcomer, who has a, yes, heavenly singing voice, but who also bears a guilty secret.

Carmela Lanza-Weil’s keenly observed production fields a strong trio of actors. Daniel Popowich is Father Abbot, stern but caring, teetering between patience and pique. Julian Findlay brings a fiery intensity to John Mark, glorying in the beauty of his musical gift while excoriating himself for his pride in it. And in the title role, Steve Henderson – by turns crabby, sardonic, empathetic and desolate – gives one of the season’s must-see performances as the profane, whiskey-slugging lost soul at the heart of this provocative play.

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Letter to the Editor; The Recorder, Greenfield, MA

 

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The power of looking and feeling good

Published: February 7, 2014 in The Washington Post

Robin Givhan’s response to the festive color palette at the State of the Union address confounded me [“State of the Union’s tacit dress code: Ladies, look like gumdrops.” Style, Jan. 30]. Men donning suits that say “authority” (i.e., drab) were applauded while women reaped a churlish response, suggesting that any woman in the chamber who wore anything other than “quiet, calm and assertive” hues was parading her insecurity in a pathetic bid for attention. Really? What if, instead, they were asserting their right to not dress in the masculine “sensible” shades of gray, navy and brown and instead were saying, “Yes, I’m a woman, and I’m confident in my place of power; I celebrate my presence, and I feel great in orange (or purple or even red checks).”At worst, they may encourage the males of the chamber to liven their wardrobes up a bit, giving those of us watching something pleasing to look at as a counterbalance to having to listen to the predictable and stale analyses.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-power-of-looking-and-feeling-good/2014/02/07/3889af8e-8e96-11e3-878e-d76656564a01_story.html

Capital Fringe Review: ‘The Last Flapper’ by Julia L. Exline  (Posted July 20, 2012)

Carmela Lanza-Weil directs The Last Flapper, a theatrical biography of Zelda Fitzgerald, with a passionate solo performance by Kate Erin Gibson as Zelda. Set on the date of her death (March 10th, 1948) Zelda is a whirlwind of emotional turmoil as she has a series of schizophrenic, one-sided conversations in the vacant office of her psychiatrist. Rebellious, flashy, and prone to sudden fits of hysteria, Zelda takes us through memories of her life, from childhood, to the moment she met Scott Fitzgerald, to personal anecdotes from their marriage. What makes this play so interesting is the fact that its text is made up primarily of Zelda’s own writings, in which she scorns her husband for never respecting her as an artist, and hiding her in his successful shadow; “I loved the artist in him, but I should have loved the artist in myself—and he should have, also.”

The material is so raw and poignant, and Kate’s performance so intense, that I left the theater feeling somewhat like an emotional dishrag. However, the look into this woman’s life (and the mental destruction that stemmed from it) through her own work was fascinating to watch. Tuesday, July 24th is Zelda’s birthday, and yes, there will be a performance! What better way to celebrate?

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“The Last Flapper presents the life of a fascinating, wounded woman who never feels like a mere caricature in this production’s hands.”

Brooke Hatfield, Washington City Paper.  July 13, 2012.

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ON THE FRINGE: Bury the Hatchet.   Philadelphia City Paper.   09/04/2011

Though cleverly staged in a lovely and tiny chapel, Bury the Hatchet tacks secular, as writer Carmela Lanza with actors Janel Bosies and Chris Pfingsten share stories posing the moral quandaries of forgiveness. They reference Simon Wiesenthal’s The Sunflower and other works, but most gripping is Lanza’s tale of her errant older brother, her family’s “Golden Child,” whose epic mess-ups stretch the limits of familial loyalty and compassionate forgiveness. Engaging, thought-provoking, and often funny, Bury the Hatchet wisely resists preaching easy answers.