[NEohioPAL] Review of CVLT's "The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild"

[Bob Abelman]

A 'Wild' and crazy ride at the CVLT

 

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 3/19/10

The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds is a marvelous, sensitive tale about growing up in a dysfunctional single-parent household with an abusive, paranoid and disillusioned mother. 

It earned playwright Paul Zindel a 1970 Obie Award, the New York Drama Critic's Circle Award for best American play of the year, and a 1971 Pulitzer Prize for drama. In 1972, 20th Century Fox turned the play into a memorable film that was directed by Paul Newman and starred Joanne Woodward.

This play's ugly sister is currently on stage at the Chagrin Valley Little Theater.

The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild has Zindel's signature themes of loneliness and shattered dreams, but it is fashioned as a rather peculiar, off-kilter comedy.  It won no accolades, earned no critical acclaim and lasted less than three weeks on Broadway in 1972.  

Mildred Wild and her nondescript, insecure and nearly invisible husband operate a Greenwich Village candy store that is about to be demolished.  Over the years, Mildred has lost touch with reality and regularly regresses into a dream world conjured up by the 3,000 movies she has eagerly devoured and the collection of movie magazines she has amassed.  Every crisis transmutes into a scene from a classic film until it is averted. 

 

A harried heroine living a pathetic life makes for a strange kind of comedy.  Add to the mix her delusions bordering on psychosis and an assortment of sadly dysfunctional, highly argumentative and unlikeable sidekick characters, and you have a disturbing kind of comedy.  The writing in this play is so askew that it offers little wiggle room to decide whether to laugh at or laugh with Mildred, or whether laughter is really the right reaction.

The CVLT production of this play, under the superb direction of Michael Rogan, not only  makes it clear when to laugh, but why.  In fact, this production wholeheartedly accentuates the funny, and does so through its fine selection of lead actors, its frantic pacing and its clever set design.  

Lisa Tarr is a brilliant Mildred.  She is in a state of perpetual motion from the beginning of the play to its end, and thoroughly inhabits the silver screen sirens that surface during her momentary lapses.  Her every action and the delivery of her every line is hilarious.

 

Tarr's antics are wonderfully off-set by Adam Young, who could not be any more milquetoast in his portrayal of Mildred's inert husband, Roy.   Young's straight face and clueless demeanor counterbalances Tarr's manic tendencies, which makes for very funny moments.

 

No moments are funnier than when Jim McCormack takes the stage.  His against-type portrayals during Mildred's imagined excursions into movieland are priceless.  After McCormack-an extraordinarily large, white male-sashays into a scene as Prissy, the tiny, black, female house servant in the 1940s classic Gone with the Wind, the play should end, the curtain should drop and people should go home.  It is a sight gag for the ages.   

 

Not all the actors in this production are as unselfconscious as Tarr, Young and McCormack, nor do they appear to be as willing to take risks and live on the edge of this quirky play.  This is unfortunate, for this play needs all the help it can get from its performers.   

 

It gets plenty of assistance from Edmond Wolff's set design, sound design and lighting.  Much of this play's humor resides in Mildred's transitions from the real world to the reel world, which are nicely facilitated by rear screen projections and an apartment that goes through the same metamorphosis as Mildred's troubled mind.  Craig Tucker's wonderful costuming adds to the fun.

 

The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild is not a great play, but this is a fine production of it.  

 

The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild continues through March 27 at the Chagrin Valley Little Theatre, 56 River Street, Chagrin Falls.  For tickets, which are $12 and $16, call 440-247-8955 or visit www.cvlt.org.
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