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Disclaimer:
The reviewers' opinions are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of TheatreLouisville.org. |
Peer Reviews Bunbury Theatre presents Reviewed by Cory Vaughn Entire contents are copyright © 2009 Cory Vaughn. All rights reserved.
"People come to a funeral to tell you how sorry they are for your loss, and end up telling you how sorry they are for themselves. Pretty soon you want to slit your own throat!" So says Raynelle Turpin about the motley crew of visitors at her husband's funeral, but she also sums up nicely what David Bottrell and Jessie Jones' comedy Dearly Departed, playing through next weekend at the Henry Clay under the auspices of Bunbury Theatre, is about. Raynelle's family has such problems that I began to suspect the deceased took the easy way out! Dysfunctional Families are hardly a new concept on the stage. They are the subjects of Hay Fever, Next to Normal, The Glass Menagerie, You Can’t Take It With You, Crimes of the Heart, and to a lesser degree, the Tuna Trilogy. They are so common on stage and screen nowadays (let us not forget American Beauty, Running with Scissors, and Little Miss Sunshine) that they run the risk of being a cliché, so to speak. So why do playwrights keep writing plays about them? And why do audiences keep paying to see plays about them? To watch the cast of Dearly Departed in action is to begin to get the idea. Sort of. This wasn't my favorite, but it isn't Bunbury's fault. This quirky ensemble, under the direction of Juergen K. Tossmann, does probably about the best job that can be done with this script, which offers mostly material you're likely to have heard before and is all rather similar in tone to the production of A Tuna Christmas (another white-trash comedy) that played for thirteen Christmases at Actors Theatre. The characters aren't exactly revelatory, either, but watching these actors sink their teeth in almost makes you forget that. Almost. The characters are the wacky Turpin family, all living in various unidentified adopted towns somewhere in the Deep South, all gathered in their unidentified hometown somewhere in the Deep South (Arkansas? Texas? Mississippi? I don't recall ever hearing it made clear) for the visitation and funeral of family patriarch Bud (Mike Burmester in a brief cameo; he re-materializes in a more substantial role later), an old coot whose anti-social, anti-religious reputation is so firmly cemented in the community that the local pastor (Dale Strange) is hard-pressed to find anything good to say about him at the funeral. Heck, his own widow Raynelle (Mary Ann Johnson) even wants to put "Mean and Surly" on his tombstone. Joining none-too-bereft Raynelle for the big send-off are her two sons, day-dreaming loser Junior (David DeSpain) and hard-working tightwad Ray-Bud (Burmester), their wives Suzanne (Junior's nagging wife, played by Susan McNeese Lynch) and Lucille (Ray-Bud's perpetually pregnant wife and mother of none, played by Diane Stretz-Thurmond), a retard of a daughter mis-named Delightful (Cindy Smith), and religious fanatic aunt Marguerite (Emily Miller) with her slacker son Royce (Ted Lesley) in tow, along with various cousins and family friends who have preposterous names like Cletus and Oveta, and who bring preposterous dishes to the funeral like Macaroni and Ham Loaf Surprise. With Cheese (of course). Once the characters are in place, however, the authors don't seem to know what to do with them. The play is virtually plot-less, content to offer up to us a southern-fried slice of what the authors would have us believe is life. There are occasional detours into life outside the play, such as Junior's failed get-rich-quick schemes, a cousin in jail, an affair with a woman in the parking lot at the local K-Mart, and (most unnecessary and unfunny of all) Lucille's persistent miscarriages. None of these go anywhere. The closest we get to a catharsis is Junior winning his alienated (and reciprocally alienating) wife back with a grape slush from Dairy Queen, and a shrug-it-off speech from punk nephew Royce about how life is nothing but a big circle. I guess you could say I didn't get it. I guess you could also say white-trash comedies are not exactly the genre for me (I've worked at Actors Theatre for years and I've never been particularly fond of A Tuna Christmas, either). I guess you could even go so far as to say it boggled my mind how Dearly Departed could have won six — SIX! — Drama-Logue Awards (including Best Writing, no less), or how it could have taken two writers to come up with every southern stereotype in the book, or how, with such a small audience on the night I attended, enough people enjoyed it the first time around that Bunbury felt the need to bring it back "By Popular Demand," at the expense of the production previously announced for this slot, Just a Matter of Time. It's still not exactly clear why the company switched at the last minute. Still, although I was somewhat disappointed in the play itself, I will recommend this production, mainly for its fine cast, led by Mr. Burmester in the role originated off-Broadway by his brother, the late, great Louisvillian artist and character actor Leo Burmester. I never had the honor of meeting Leo or seeing him act, but for his brief appearance in Broadcast News; however, those of us who work at Actors Theatre know his name, and those of us who consider ourselves musical-theatre geeks and who have listened obsessively to the Les Miserables soundtrack certainly know his voice. These are big shoes to fill, but I think Leo would be proud of Mike's solid work as put-upon Ray-Bud, the Number One son charged with organizing (and paying for) the funeral from hell. Among supporting performances, Mr. Lesley and Ms. Miller have some great banter as the squabbling Bible Belt relic and her wastrel son. Mr. Strange seems to have a great time doing double-duty as a sick minister and an aging, hunchbacked stroke survivor, Liz Vissing brings her usual comic flair to several smaller roles, and Raquel Cecil has a priceless bit as a woman whose naming system for her children is best left for you to discover yourself. Yet I am more surprised than anyone to report that the actor who impressed me the most in the end was the one saddled with playing Poor Jeannie One-Note all night! I refer, of course, to the aforementioned Ms. Smith, who finds unexpected feeling beneath the rather grotesque surface of sloppy dingbat Delightful. As far as I can remember, she only speaks three times and otherwise only opens her mouth to eat. But Ms. Smith finds such love and simplicity inside this aloof and impervious slob that her final scene is surprisingly touching. Delightful, indeed!
Dearly Departed Presented at the Henry Clay Theatre Thru April 26, 2009 Tickets: Starring: Mike Burmester, Mary Ann Johnson, Diane Stretz-Thurmond, David DeSpain, Susan McNeese Lynch, Emily Miller, Ted Lesley, Dale Strange, Cindy Smith, Raquel Cecil, and Liz Vissing.
Posted Apr. 19, 2009
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