[NEohioPAL] Review of "A Christmas Story" at Cleveland Play House

[Bob Abelman]

Seeing A Christmas Story for the first and final time

 

Bob Abelman

News-Herald, Chagrin Valley Times, Solon Times, Geauga Times Courier

Member, International Association of Theatre Critics 

 

This review appeared in the News-Herald 12/18/09

 

Like the resolute few who refused to become pods in the sci-fi film Invasion of the Body Snatchers, there are those of us who have yet to join in the holiday ritual of seeing A Christmas Story at the Cleveland Play House.  

 

It's nothing personal or intentional.  Things have been busy around the holidays. for the past five years.  

 

For remnant A Christmas Story neophytes, this weekend is the last opportunity to see this cult classic for the first time.  There are but five more performances, after which the theater's brain-trust has decided to move forward and find the next holiday staple for this coveted slot in the schedule.  

 

After giving in and finally seeing this production last weekend, here is a podcast of what the remaining handful of holdouts have been missing.   

Philip Grecian's A Christmas Story is not unlike Charles Dickens' classic "A Christmas Carol" in that the audience experiences a warm and fuzzy feeling by visiting a Christmas past with the main character.  In this case, he is an amiable fellow in his 30s, played wonderfully by Christopher Burns, who serves as the show's narrator.  That is where the similarities stop.  

 

With a grown up Ralph as our guide, we go back to the Indiana suburb of his youth, to December of 1938.  Here we find a nine-year-old Ralphie who wants an official Red Ryder 200-shot Carbine Action Range Model Air Rifle for Christmas.  We witness Ralphie's assorted schemes to get the BB gun and, in doing so, are introduced to his quirky family, his mildly dysfunctional friends and a model of middle-America during a simpler time. 

 

A Christmas Story is not unlike a Charles Schultz "Peanuts" TV special, where the world is seen through the romanticized eyes of a cartoon child as written by an adult.   In fact, this play is very much a live-action cartoon and director Seth Gordon accentuates everything that is remotely cartoonish in this production.

 

The cartoon humor in this production is broad, predictable and repetitive.  There are numerous running jokes.  There are sight gags.  Each time that Ralphie's father-the Old Man-comes home from work, he bolts through the front door after being attacked by the neighbor's vicious dogs. It's hard not to envision Fred coming home from work and being tossed out of his front door by a saber toothed house pet at the start of every episode of The Flintstones.   

 

Charles Kartali, as the Old Man, is a Fred Flintstone-a loud, boisterous and endearingly harmless guy.  His fellow performers also deliver caricatures.  Elizabeth Ann Townsend, as the Mom, is Jessica Rabbit in a housedress.  Joey Stefanko, who plays Ralphie, channels Charlie Brown's grief and Elroy Jetson's misguided ingenuity.   His friends include the equivalents of a know-it-all Lucy, a Pigpen and a Little Redheaded Girl played by Courtney Nelson as Helen, Kole Selznick Hoffman as Schwartz and Olivia Doria as Esther Jane, respectively. 

 

Even the various set pieces that simultaneously share the stage closely resemble animation cels.  Beautifully designed by Michael Ganio, they offer slightly exaggerated representations of a living room, a school room, a street lamp and the Higbee's showroom that are so richly saturated with light and color that they appear cartoonish.   

 

A Christmas Story is not unlike the 1983 film on which it is based, written by Jean Shepherd and shot largely in Cleveland.  Knowledgeable audience members react with nodding approval upon the delivery of a familiar line, a recognized catchphrase or the occurrence of a specific moment in the play that resembles a comparable moment in the film. 

 

There is comfort in familiarity, and A Christmas Story covers very familiar territory in its nostalgic venture into the past, its cartoon characteristics and its celluloid heritage.  Is it great theater?  No, but it moves fast and it is delivered well.  Have the unwashed few been missing a culturally significant something over the last five years?  Not really.

 

Nonetheless, this holiday tradition will be sorely missed by those multitudes who have claimed it as their own.  There are but five more performances to see A Christmas Story  for the first or final time.

 

A Christmas Story continues through December 20 in The Cleveland Play House's Bolton Theatre.  For tickets, which range from $23 to $64, call 216-795-7000 or visit www.clevelandplayhouse.com.
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