There's no getting around it: as Gypsy Productions comes to the end of its inaugural season, its shows are taking on a consistently professional quality. The real breakthrough came a couple of months ago with Bent. This harrowing script about the persecution of gays in the Holocaust was turned into a powerfully acted, artistically designed production that lingered in the memory long after the final curtain. Then, a few weeks ago, Dear George — a selection of letters to President Bush — brought political theater back to the Tampa Bay area, and did so with fine acting, simple but attractive design, and solid directing. And now Charles Busch's You Should Be So Lucky has taken the stage at the Suncoast Theatre, and the performers are first-class, the design is persuasively detailed and the directing is as impressive as anything else Gypsy has offered. Busch's play is no great shakes — it's really just a clever sitcom — but the production is so polished you can't help but feel that St. Pete's Gypsy has come of age, and much sooner than most interested spectators might have predicted. Lucky asks: Can an electrologist (unwanted-hair remover) who inherits $10 million from a customer keep all that money, even when the customer's greedy daughter is determined to nullify the will? Besides the irrelevance of that not-very-pressing question, the play suffers from silly one-liners, a love subplot of no real significance and certain pivotally illogical narrative developments. But there are also some strengths: a very funny slapstick scene involving a corpse on a couch, some unexpectedly original segments in which one character is possessed by the dead relatives of another, and, not least, the peaceful coexistence on one stage of gay and straight personages. The weaknesses far outweigh the strengths, I'm sorry to say — at least for those of us who aren't dead, electrologists or millionaires — and you'll leave Lucky without any new insights into any subject that matters. But you will have experienced some top-notch acting, design and direction. And on a couple of occasions you'll have enjoyed some good laughs.
The story is, to say the least, improbable. Lonely-guy hair-remover Christopher sees elderly Mr. Rosenberg faint on a city sidewalk and brings him up to his apartment. Mr. Rosenberg, eager to show his gratitude to the charitable young man, becomes one of Christopher's only patients. At a charity ball, Christopher meets a second important person, an eligible but neurotic publicist named Walter. Moments before Walter visits Chris at the latter's apartment, Rosenberg, in mid-electrolysis, has a heart seizure and dies. At first Chris hides the corpse from Walter, but he eventually comes clean and reports the death to the police. A month later, Rosenberg's daughter Lenore calls on Chris to tell him that he's inherited half her father's estate, an inheritance which she demands that he renounce. As Chris considers his options, the ghost of Mr. Rosenberg suddenly appears and advises steadfastness in the face of ill-tempered Lenore's threats. In an effort to shame Lenore into quiescence, Walter gets Chris and Lenore onto a Jerry Springer-like talk show, the subject of which is "Homosexuals Who Inherit Straight Bucks." Will Chris get his millions? Will Chris and Walter stay together? Will the ghost of Mr. Rosenberg ever tire of the role of Chris' adviser?
One could start anywhere in praising the actors: for example, with Ian Sullivan, whose Mr. Rosenberg is a kindly, sensitive gentleman who signs on as Chris' client as a way of saying "thank you," and then discovers that he's come to depend on the long conversations he shares with the young man. As Christopher, Scott Raneri is modest and sincere; as Walter, Brian Martin is nervous and nervously busy; and as Lenore, the actress "Brick" is as comically obnoxious as can be. There are two other roles: Chris' flamboyant sister Polly, charmingly played by Joleen Wilkinson, and talk show host Wanda Wilson, deftly impersonated by Kelly Burnette. Robert Trisolini's direction is kinetic and precise, and Trevor Keller's set, of Christopher's messy apartment/office, is rendered in convincing detail. Keller also designed the many persuasive costumes.
As I noted a few weeks ago, a problem that most new theater companies have is insufficient funds with which to mount deluxe productions. Nevertheless, top-notch scripts generally don't cost any more than third-rate ones, and, even on a budget, it's possible to create satisfying (simple) sets and costumes. What's crucial is a commitment to excellence; if a company has that, it'll find a way to everything else.
It's looking like Gypsy has that commitment where productions are concerned. Three impressive stagings in a row make that clear enough.
Now all that's needed is a similar commitment to first-rate plays.
Then Gypsy will become an essential presence on the local theater scene.
Striking Gold.
The most original, provocative and expertly staged play I've seen in months turned up last week not in one of our professional theaters but at the University of South Florida in Tampa.
Adam Rapp's Finer Noble Gases is about two stoned-out, marginal young men, hilariously played by Michael Wiley and David Black, living in an epically messy apartment house. As directed — brilliantly — by Kerry Glamsch, their story became a metaphor for the chaos and anomie that is modern life. When, in the midst of filth and disorder, a man and a woman (Burton Tedesco and Joann Wilson) suddenly broke into a loving, graceful dance set to a Willie Nelson song, the effect was pure magic. I was enchanted. And I still am.
This is what modern theater should be about: revelation, insight, beauty.
If there were more productions like this one, we would all be kings.
This article appears in Nov 10-16, 2004.