Cynthia Bryant and Sammie Wayne (Photo by Doug Engalla)
Reviewed by Martín Hernández
Lonny Chapman Theatre
Through July 7
RECOMMENDED
Even a bumpy presentation of the 1936 George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart comedic chestnut can still offer a pleasant ride, a fact attested to by director Leota Rhodes’ uneven but boisterous production. The play is filled with jokes and sight gags; if one does not hit, another is just around the corner. Coming on the heels of the Great Depression, it also proffers the thoughtful message that we find true wealth in family, friends, and fun, a theme that still resonates today as we are — again — living in a world swelling with financial, social, and political upheaval.
“Life is pretty simple if you just relax,” is just one of Martin “Grandpa” Vanderhof’s (Lloyd Pedersen) pithy but profound mottoes and he lives it to the hilt. Unfulfilled by the corporate rat race, Grandpa left his own lucrative business 35 years prior and never looked back. Surviving on a reasonable income from a real estate holding, his time is now filled with stamp collecting, attending college commencements, caring for his pet lizard, and going to circuses.
Meanwhile, Grandpa’s eccentric brood exists as if under its own “big top” in his rambling New York City home. His daughter Penny Sycamore (Brenda James) writes confusing and unproduced plays for a peculiar reason, while her husband Paul (Larry Toffler) makes fireworks in the basement with Mr. De Pinna (Khoushik), a former delivery man won over by Grandpa’s anti-establishment philosophy.
The Sycamores’ daughter Essie (Holly Seidcheck) is an aspiring but inept ballet dancer and her husband Ed (Tack Sappington) is so captivated by his new printing press that he will print anything that sounds “catchy” — even revolutionary slogans that hold no political meaning for him. And while Boris Kolenkhov (Danny Salay), a Russian monarchist and Essie’s sympathetic dance teacher, rants against the Bolsheviks for overthrowing the Czar, the Vanderhof household unwittingly adheres to Karl Marx’s adage, “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”
The only “normal” family member is Alice (Jessica Kent), another Sycamore daughter, who works at a Wall Street firm and is enamored of Tony (Ryan Rathbun), scion to the company’s owner. While Alice loves her family and feels there is a “nobility about them” despite their whacky behavior, she is apprehensive about her relationship with Tony considering their divergent backgrounds. When Tony brings his rich and snooty parents (Kevin Michael Moran and Sara Shearer) over for dinner to meet Alice’s kin, everyone’s odd predilections combine for an explosive evening, confirming the lament of Donald (Sammie Wayne), boyfriend of the Sycamore’s beloved Black housekeeper Rheba (Cynthia Bryant), that “White folks are always getting into trouble.”
Some of the roles are double cast, which perhaps accounts for the tentativeness of some performances and the opening night line flubs and missed cues. Pederson as Grandpa is at his best as he enrages an annoying IRS agent (Tom Kramer) with his wily and wise reasoning for avoiding paying income tax for 24 years. James’ Penny and Toffler’s Paul make for a touching pair in a key scene exemplifying Grandpa’s sagest advice: “Don’t do anything that you’re not going to enjoy doing.” Mareli Mitchel-Shields’ cluttered set suitably reflects the household’s anarchic lifestyle and Frank McKown’s lighting plot effectively augments Paul’s expression of his pyrotechnic proclivities.
Lonny Chapman Theatre (Main Stage) 10900 Burbank Blvd., N. Hollywood. Fri.-Sat., 8 pm, Sun., 2 pm; thru July 7. www.thegrouprep.com
