Humbug!
There. I’ve said it. Not everyone loves this time of year, you
know.
Oh, people light candles. They chop down perfectly lovely trees;
they eat fudge and fruitcake and latkes and sour cream until even the
seams of their banquet pants are seriously strained.
But this is all a diversion: Darkness is descending, people.
No amount of fa-la-la-ing is going to change that.
Meanwhile, theaters have gotten into the holiday act, with seasonal
folderol bouncing on the boards around town. Thus, I must do my
duty.
First stop: Tuna, Texas.
Live Theatre Workshop’s A Tuna Christmas is the second of
what has become a series of Tuna plays dreamed up by Jaston Williams,
Joe Sears and Ed Howard. For the uninitiated, Tuna is a tiny town in
Texas. Its denizens are the epitome of the finest—or
worst—characters rural Texas has to offer. And 20-plus of these
folks are brought to life by two actors.
The plot is about as substantial as a snowfall in Tucson. A vandal
is causing trouble for a contest regarding the best outdoor Christmas
display. Family woes worsen under the seasonal pressure to be cheerful.
And the town’s holiday production of A Christmas Carol is
threatened because somebody didn’t pay the electric bill.
But the plot is incidental to the parade of characters at the heart
of this modest comedy.
There’s Didi Snavely, owner of Didi’s Used Weapons. Then there’s
Bertha Bumiller, who sets her brooding daughter, Charlene, straight by
proclaiming, “Baptists don’t commit suicide.”
Dear Petey Fisk of the Humane Society exhorts people not to give
exotic animals as Christmas presents. “Although baby alligators sure
are cute, when they grow up, you just know they will try to mate with
your luggage.”
And then there are Inita Goodwin and Helen Bedd (say the names out
loud), career girls who have found their calling at the Tasty
Crème.
Stephen Frankenfield and Keith Wick embody all these characters with
gusto. Wick creates his from the inside out, a technique that gives
these outrageous folks depth and a touching honesty. Frankenfield
throws on his characters as he does his costumes. It’s a lesser
approach, but the two play well off each other.
Director Jodi Rankin has made some curious choices, particularly by
shifting too many scenes to distinguish the different locales. Not only
does all of this activity impede the play’s momentum; it interferes
with the fun of the characters doing their quick-change magic. And it’s
just not necessary. Trust your actors to let us know where they
are.
Next stop: On the Road to the North Pole.
The Gaslight Theatre has been making Southern Arizonans laugh and
hiss and boo for more than 30 years with its corny but cleverly crafted
melodramas. On the Road to the North Pole doesn’t
disappoint.
Writer/director Peter Van Slyke has his current naughty/nice crew
trying to save Christmas. How? By putting on a show, of course, and
takin’ it to the streets of places like Morocco and Rio—you know,
the usual spots you associate with Christmas. And it’s all going to
culminate in a worldwide radio broadcast from the North Pole.
Scat Sweeney (Todd Thompson) and Fearless Frazier (Mike Yarema) join
with lovely ladies Sandy (Deborah Lederer) and Dorothy (Katherine
Byrnes) to smile and sparkle as members of the Christmas Follies. But
slimy Max Pomade (Sean MacArthur) and his daft but loyal sidekick,
Knuckles (Daved Wilkins), are out to get the guys, because they owe
Pomade money.
And bad guy Wilhelm Reinholt (David Orley) is committed to bringing
down the Follies because he never got the shiny train he asked for as a
child. (Lord, psychology has infiltrated even melodrama.)
The fun is enormously enhanced by scenic designer Tom Benson’s
wonderful backdrops and special effects, like camels carrying the
characters through the desert and airplanes that really fly. OK, they
look like they’re really flying.
Of course, none of this would be much fun at all without the nonstop
enthusiasm and good-natured energy of the talented troupe of actors.
And how about that hardworking band! Linda Ackermann wears out those
piano keys, and bassist Blake Matthies and drummer Jimmy Carr don’t
miss a beat.
Yeah, yeah. It’s shtick. But it’s very well-done shtick. And it’s a
heckuva lot of entertainment bang for the buck.
If you can sit through this raucous fun without cracking a smile,
you’d better check yourself into the funeral home next door to the
theater.
As it turns out, I’m not eligible. I might not even qualify for
humbug status anymore—because LTW’s tacky Tuna and
Gaslight’s good-natured goofiness helped vanquish the dark, if just for
a moment.
See? Theater is magic!
This article appears in Dec 3-9, 2009.