Stage

Mid-Year Report Card.

by J. Cooper Robb

The first half of the Philadelphia area theater season wasn’t sensational but it has been unpredictable with many of the top productions coming from unlikely sources.

In the past six months there have only been a handful of outstanding shows: The Arden Theatre Company’s Gee’s Bend, Mauckingbird Theatre Company’s staging of Shakespeare’s R&J, Crooked Mirror’s Bash: Latter-Day Plays, People’s Light and Theatre Company’s The Persians and the Walnut Street Theatre’s Hairspray.

Typically, Fringe shows from newfound theaters are a nightmare. The fledgling Crooked Mirror’s Bash:latterday plays was like a bad dream, but the nightmarish world presented by director Aaron Oster and his talented cast was also one of the festival’s finest productions.

Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder’s Gee’s Bend could have been just another drama about an black family struggling against the forces of racism. Wilder’s play has its’ flaws, but what made the experience so moving was director Eleanor Holdridge’s stylish production, which featured a collaboration of theater artists in near perfect harmony.

Artistic director Peter Reynolds’ production of Shakespeare’s R&J announced Mauckingbird as a company to watch. Superbly performed by a young cast, this tender all-male adaptation of Romeo and Juliet was an exercise in theatrical daring and easily the summer’s top show.

A festive musical about bigotry and huge hair, the Walnut’s exhilarating production of Hairspray proved that the 200-year-old theater still knows how to party. Superbly directed by Charles Abbott and enthusiastically performed by a talented cast, the feel-good production had audiences literally dancing in the aisles.

One of the biggest surprises was People’s Light’s staging of Aeschylus 2500-year-old tragedy The Persians. A provocative look at a global superpower involved in an unfortunate and unnecessary war, the gripping production proved that a play doesn’t need to be new to be timely.

While great productions were rare there was no shortage of fine acting. Among the top performances in the season’s first half was Charlotte Northeast’s devastating portrayal of a woman convict in Bash: Latter-Day Plays, Peter DeLaurier’s pitch-perfect performance as the title character in Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Jersey Lily at PLTC , Faith Prince’s characterization of an emotionally fragile New Yorker in Unusual Acts of Devotion at Philadelphia Theatre Company, Dan Hodge’s startling portrayal in EgoPo’s Woyzeck and the entire cast of the 11th Hour Theatre Company’s entertaining musical romp Reefer Madness.

Of course not everything the local companies’ touched turned to gold.

At the Arden artistic director Terrence J. Nolen’s staging of the musical Candide was creative and assured, but though the show is musically pleasing, the story is both muddled and antiquated.

The Rodgers and Hammerstein musical State Fair, a curious choice to open the Walnut’s 200th anniversary season considering it is the only R&H score written for the screen, received a competent production, but the show is absurdly dated and the lackluster score is perhaps the duo’s weakest.

But these two archaic musicals weren’t the only bad news. Contemporary plays we could have done without included the satires An Impending Rupture the Belly at Flashpoint Theatre and the Interact Theatre Company’s The War Party. Two comedies, 1812 Productions This is the Week That Is: The Election Special and Schmucks at the Wilma Theater offered few laughs and the Lantern Theater Company’s staging of the 19th-century satire The Government Inspector was a rare misstep for the usually reliable Center City theater.

In all these cases (with the exception of the misguided Inspector) the problem was not with the production but rather the play. Experience has shown that while a bad production can ruin a great play, even the best production is rarely capable of hiding the inadequacies of a weak script.

Good news is on the horizon. In late January the calendar is loaded with new plays including three developed at the local Playpenn New Play Development Conference (My Name is Asher Lev, The Rant and The Day of the Picnic) as well as Resurrection, the new work from acclaimed playwright Daniel Beaty which is making its local debut at the Philadelphia Theatre Company.

Finally the local theater community suffered two losses with the closings of the longstanding companies Mum Puppettheatre and Hotel Obligado. Known for producing provocative and adventurous theater, both will be missed.