[NEohioPAL]Rave Review for "Over the River" at Actors' Summit

Mon Jan 14 09:40:00 PST 2002

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Grandma's house is a delight with charming seniors 
01/14/02
Linda Eisenstein
Special to The Plain Dealer

Sometime during the second act of "Over the River and Through the Woods," a 
silver-haired actor announces: "We're all old. We're adorable." 

That could be the tag line for the Actors' Summit production of Joe 
DiPietro's sweet, funny play about intergenerational family ties. For it 
would be difficult to find a more adorable quartet of grandparents gracing an 
area stage or a play that so thoroughly pleases and connects with its 
audience. 

Like the tune, "Over the River and Through the Woods" is about a series of 
trips to Grandmother's house: in this case, the homey dining room of the 
passionately traditional Gianelli family of Trenton, N.J., where 29-year-old 
Nick (Peter Voinovich) has Sunday dinner with both sets of grandparents each 
week. 

It opens with a crisis: Nick has been offered a promotion that necessitates a 
move to Seattle, which would leave the elderly grandparents on their own. The 
course of the play charts the riotous course of their high-stakes 
machinations: guilt trips, hurried matchmaking and family revelations to keep 
Nick from leaving. 

At Actors' Summit, the success of DiPietro's commercial comedy/drama, which 
in structure tacks frequently between sitcom and sentimentality, rests 
squarely on the performances director Neil Thackaberry gets from his elder 
actors: Glen Colerider, Jean Colerider, Robert Snook and Lenne Snively. 

They're charmers all, but Thackaberry isn't content to let them coast on 
charm. It's the deeper character revelations and truths that elevate the 
drama and earn all the laughs and tears. 

Although the cast is more WASP than convincingly Italian, that doesn't matter 
a whit: DiPietro's play examines a shift in values that crosses ethnic lines, 
and his "3 Fs: family, faith and food" clearly resonate in suburban Hudson. 

As the stoic Nunzio, who struggles with whether he should reveal a serious 
illness, Robert Snook alone is worth the drive to Summit County. With 
bristling white mustache, a spine bent with age, sad hound-dog eyes and 
impeccable comic timing, he makes the second-act Trivial Pursuit game into a 
brilliant "who's on first" routine. Snook's understated performance is 
breathtaking. 

Glen Colerider contrasts nicely as the stormy paternal grandfather Frank, 
whose immigrant reminiscences are more complex than they first seem. 
Petite Jean Colerider, hair in tight apricot curls, is spot-on as the 
food-obsessed grandma Aida, and Lenne Snively has a brassy charm as Nunzio's 
hearty wife Emma. 

As the protagonist/narrator, Peter Voinovich does well with a role that is 
mainly reaction. Susanna Holbrath plays Nick's blind date Caitlin with an odd 
combination of syrupy sweetness and brittleness. 

Robert Stegmiller's superb set - a comfy living room, dining room and porch - 
feels so real you could live in it. It's exactly right, down to the choice of 
doilies, afghans and porcelain knickknacks. 

Eisenstein is a playwright in Cleveland.  2002 The Plain Dealer. Used with 
permission.

Actors' Summit, 86 Owen Brown Street, Hudson, OH 44236, 330-342-0800, 
actorssummit.org.

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<HTML>Grandma's house is a delight with charming seniors 
 01/14/02
 Linda Eisenstein
 Special to The Plain Dealer
 
 Sometime during the second act of "Over the River and Through the Woods," a silver-haired actor announces: "We're all old. We're adorable." 
 
 That could be the tag line for the Actors' Summit production of Joe DiPietro's sweet, funny play about intergenerational family ties. For it would be difficult to find a more adorable quartet of grandparents gracing an area stage or a play that so thoroughly pleases and connects with its audience. 
 
 Like the tune, "Over the River and Through the Woods" is about a series of trips to Grandmother's house: in this case, the homey dining room of the passionately traditional Gianelli family of Trenton, N.J., where 29-year-old Nick (Peter Voinovich) has Sunday dinner with both sets of grandparents each week. 
 
 It opens with a crisis: Nick has been offered a promotion that necessitates a move to Seattle, which would leave the elderly grandparents on their own. The course of the play charts the riotous course of their high-stakes machinations: guilt trips, hurried matchmaking and family revelations to keep Nick from leaving. 
 
 At Actors' Summit, the success of DiPietro's commercial comedy/drama, which in structure tacks frequently between sitcom and sentimentality, rests squarely on the performances director Neil Thackaberry gets from his elder actors: Glen Colerider, Jean Colerider, Robert Snook and Lenne Snively. 
 
 They're charmers all, but Thackaberry isn't content to let them coast on charm. It's the deeper character revelations and truths that elevate the drama and earn all the laughs and tears. 
 
 Although the cast is more WASP than convincingly Italian, that doesn't matter a whit: DiPietro's play examines a shift in values that crosses ethnic lines, and his "3 Fs: family, faith and food" clearly resonate in suburban Hudson. 
 
 As the stoic Nunzio, who struggles with whether he should reveal a serious illness, Robert Snook alone is worth the drive to Summit County. With bristling white mustache, a spine bent with age, sad hound-dog eyes and impeccable comic timing, he makes the second-act Trivial Pursuit game into a brilliant "who's on first" routine. Snook's understated performance is breathtaking. 
 
 Glen Colerider contrasts nicely as the stormy paternal grandfather Frank, whose immigrant reminiscences are more complex than they first seem. 
 Petite Jean Colerider, hair in tight apricot curls, is spot-on as the food-obsessed grandma Aida, and Lenne Snively has a brassy charm as Nunzio's hearty wife Emma. 
 
 As the protagonist/narrator, Peter Voinovich does well with a role that is mainly reaction. Susanna Holbrath plays Nick's blind date Caitlin with an odd combination of syrupy sweetness and brittleness. 
 
 Robert Stegmiller's superb set - a comfy living room, dining room and porch - feels so real you could live in it. It's exactly right, down to the choice of doilies, afghans and porcelain knickknacks. 
 
 Eisenstein is a playwright in Cleveland.  2002 The Plain Dealer. Used with permission.
 
 Actors' Summit, 86 Owen Brown Street, Hudson, OH 44236, 330-342-0800, actorssummit.org.</HTML>

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