Millbrook: "The Hallelujah Girls"

The program notes for Millbrook's production of The Hallelujah Girls lists several of their veteran comic actresses in the cast, so audience expectations were high for what was to become yet another delightful encounter with them.

The play -- one of a small cottage industry by playwrights Jessie Jones, Nicholas Hope, and Jamie Wooten  -- relies on an improbably silly plot through which the assorted archetypical "girls" demonstrate their individual quirks while [in response to another friend's death] they transform a redundant church into the SPA--DEE--DAH salon...and with many economic, social, political, and romantic entanglements that need to be remedied, the two acts entertain as things get twisted out of proportion.

Director Cheryl Phillips trusts her fine ensemble cast [Jamie Brown, Karla McGhee, Pat McClellan, Vicki Moses, Steve Phillips, Terry Quotes, Tracey Quotes, Margaret White] to deliver the goods; and though the staging is relatively static and scene changes take too long, the acting company inhabit their characters and land their witty dialogue with confidence.

We know these people; they walk amongst us...and Millbrook's Hallelujah Girls are so truthful that we applaud the result...a good old-fashioned entertaining evening of theatre.

ASF: "Ken Ludwig's BASKERVILLE: a Sherlock Holmes Mystery"

At the curtain call of the Alabama Shakespeare Festival's production of Ken Ludwig's BASKERVILLE: a Sherlock Holmes Mystery, the backstage crew and dressers are brought out for a well-deserved ovation. They had been working silently and out-of-sight for the past two hours, flawlessly manipulating scenic elements, props, and innumerable split-second costume changes for the five-member acting ensemble who portray more than 40 characters. 

Director Laura Kepley deftly manages this madcap farcical interpretation of one of Arthur Conan Doyle's most famous escapades of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. -- Though true to Doyle's original, audiences are challenged to keep up with the main plot, sub-plots, red herrings, witty dialogue, exaggerated dialects, and broadly comical delineations of characters that drive the action at a rapid pace.

Paige Hathaway's flexible, multi-leveled and evocative set, Rob Denton's sophisticated lighting, Jane Shaw's confident sound design, Kelly Colburn's stunningly effective projections, and Lex Liang's period character-driven and often humorous costumes offer a collaboration that supports the actors and the script.

The impressive acting ensemble -- Grant Chapman [Holmes], Todd Cerveris [Watson], with Michael Doherty, Justin Blanchard, and Madeleine Lambert as "everyone else" -- are so finely disciplined and specific in their choices of posture and dialect that make each character distinct, that we forget there are only five of them. 

And they have to tell the convoluted story of a family curse and deaths attributed to a "hellhound" on the moors near the Baskerville estate, the latest of which conscripts Holmes to solve and to prevent the death of the latest family member to inherit the title and the land.

It's all a great deal of fun for audiences to try to solve the mystery along with Holmes, but entertainment is the key to Ludwig's take on the tale. And we get it big-time here. Many twists and turns, many revelations, and even more laughs as we become complicit in the story and its outcome.

Come to ASF for the story, come for the costumes, and the set, and the projections, come for the laughs. Admire the talents of the acting ensemble. And have a good evening out.

WOBT: "A Streetcar Named Desire"

If not for community and university theatres, the River Region would be hard-pressed to find significant attention to the standard and classic repertoire, and Prattville's Way Off Broadway Theatre's challenging  season includes Shakespeare's Twelfth Night [coming in July] and its latest production of Tennessee Williams's A Streetcar Named Desire. 

First-time director Kaden Blackburn has curiously re-set the play some decades after its original 1947 time period, and his set is so bright and open that it works against Williams's gritty claustrophobic post-World War II New Orleans location.

That notwithstanding, and though uneven in pace and conflict, Mr. Blackburn has elicited strong performances from his able cast -- particularly his principal players -- who provide a number of powerfully sensitive moments during the two-and--half-hour running time.

When a confused and damaged Blanche Du Bois [Alex Rikerd] arrives at the dingy apartment of her pregnant sister Stella [Maggie Kervin] and working-class brother-in-law Stanley Kowalski [Douglas Dean Mitchell], she disrupts their lives by contrasting the gentility of her Southern-belle social status with the boozy grit of Stanley's "common" upbringing. -- Clearly all is not well with Blanche, and Stanley sets out to uncover the truth about her reduced circumstances. Ms. Rikerd's admission of Blanche's many failures comes at a cost. Even the potential of developing a relationship with Mitch [Josh Williams], one of Stanley's poker-playing friends, seems doomed from the start.

These four actors deliver multi-layered characterization with consistent vocal and physical commitment. Though Stanley is sometimes abusive towards Stella [perhaps from what is now known as wartime PTSD], both Mr. Mitchell and Ms. Kervin are convincing in their characters' love for one another. Ms. Kervin and Ms. Rikerd show a truthfulness of sibling rivalries and misunderstanding with a strength that is unusual in many productions. Mr. Mitchell and Mr. Williams enliven scenes of male bonding and friendships. Mr. Williams and Ms. Rikerd are heartbreaking in scenes that test and ultimately break up the romance between Mitch and Blanche. 

But the tension between Blanche and Stanley builds throughout the play to its violent conclusion that sends Blanche over the edge to pitiable compliance in agreeing to institutional help and "the kindness of strangers"; well done. 

Wetumpka Depot: "The Bachelorette Party"

A skillful acting ensemble carry the farcical intent of the Wetumpka Depot's production of Karen Schaeffer's The Bachelorette Party in a raucous laugh-out-loud evening. Director Beth Butler guides them through two acts of non-stop antics that leave audiences entertained throughout and happy at the outcome.

Even with last minute casting changes, the company [Tammy Arvidson, Seth Bordlee, Brad Cooper, Sydney Burdette Humphrey, Josh Carples, Christina Knuckles, Zac Morris, Brad Sinclair, Leanna Wallace] only occasionally appear tentative in their physical and vocal commitment, so audiences go willingly along for the ride.

Prepare yourself for slamming doors [there are seven entrances], characters literally being caught "with their pants down", several running gags, a few embarrassing moments associated with alcohol and recreational drugs, all in service of a formulaic comic plot in which the assorted couples plan -- in exactly the same way -- to escape a bachelorette party and meet for their private romantic dalliances. Hi-jinks abound.

Anything that can go wrong does go wrong, but as a comedy the end result when all the participants are eventually on-stage together, resolves things in a delightful way that pleases everyone.

Theatre AUM: "Buddies: a Bro-mantic Comedy"

With clever dialogue and engaging performances by Theatre AUM's seven ensemble actors under Neil David Seibel's able direction, Buddies: a Bro-mantic Comedy by Ben Abbott opened its Alabama debut on Thursday after its generation at the "Hollins Playwrights Lab" last Summer.

In a series of episodes, David [Meadow Lokey] and Julia [Sam Crevensten] host concurrent gatherings at their home: a book-club meeting for the women which is more about gossip than literature, and an awkward men's meeting where they watch football and reveal little about themselves or their mates.

Julia's sister Kelsey [Sarah Paterson] and her partner Adam [Michael James Pritchard], married couple Jake [Zameron Boozer] and Erica [Tara Laurel], and friend Billy [Aaron Rudnick] make up the mix of multi-dimensional characters who break the stereotypical male and female expectations.

And their children [never seen but impactfully present via special effects] enter and exit like tornadoes every once in a while.

While the women cajole their men to become more open and reveal to them their "secrets", the men -- uncomfortable and reluctant at first -- eventually discover for themselves and surprisingly for the women how liberated they become during the play's two acts.

It's all lighthearted fare interspersed with more serious investigations of such subjects as friendship, marriage, social discomfort, homophobia, political disagreement, and the possibilities of genuine Platonic love among men...all of which become catalysts for every character's growth.

Design elements are all top-notch in supporting the text and characters, though sound levels are frequently too soft; and actors' voices are sometimes drowned out by audience laughter or for lack of vocal support.

Buddies: a Bro-mantic Comedy is a delightful comedy that leaves audiences smiling and laughing, perhaps in recognizing a lot about themselves.