Neil Simon’s brilliant dialog and wonderful
sense of humor sparkle in the hands of Director Lenny Liebowitz and his
outstanding student cast as Otterbein Summer Theater opens its 50th
anniversary season with “Brighton Beach Memoirs”. Jordan Wood has wonderful comic timing, outstanding
gestures, fabulous facial expression and a true gift for physical comedy as Eugene,
a typical New York City Jewish teenager embarking upon the discovery of
everything sexual with the help of his older brother Stanley, played with
wonderful nuance and steady consistency by Max Bartel. Aubree Tally has perfected the attitude and
tone of the stereotypical Jewish mother, Kate.
Supporting cast members Daria Redus (Blanche), Abigail Isom (Laurie)
Kara Jobe (Nora) and Jack Labrecque (Jack) all have their special moments, mining
the depth and breadth of Simon’s rich characters.
The script was written to be delivered on a
large proscenium style stage. Cramming
it onto the smallish three-quarter thrust area of the Fritsche Theater stage
that Otterbein Summer Theatre now calls home, just doesn’t work very well. Rob Johnson’s set design does the best it can
with the limited space, but the bedrooms don’t have any room for beds. There is not enough room on stage for a table
with chairs plus the living room furniture.
Consequently, the dinner scene is people sitting on chairs in a
rectangular formation and miming eating dinner.
The cast does as good a job as any acting group would with this kind of
situation, but it just doesn’t work very well for my taste.
Lighting in this limited setting has similar
challenges.
Rebecca White’s costumes are period
appropriate and quite effective, especially Eugene’s knickers with vest and
ball cap.
Overall, I enjoyed the show because of the
brilliant acting and line delivery of Neil Simon’s witty prose.
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