[NEohioPAL] Review of "Dividing the Estate" at Ensemble Theatre

[Bob Abelman]

Ensemble Theatre puts Foote in mouth

 

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 11/26/10

 

The Gordon family in Horton Foote's comedy Dividing the Estate bears a striking resemblance to the ghoulish Addams family from TV, film and, originally, The New Yorker magazine cartoons.

 

Of course, the folksy Foote, who penned the award-winning screenplays for Tender Mercies and A Trip to Bountiful, prefers the melancholy over the macabre, fancies rural Texas over Transylvania, and creates characters toxic only to themselves.   

 

Still, both are satirical depictions of American family eccentricities, where wealth, a pathological fondness for family lore, and an antiquated world-view render each clan blissfully oblivious to the harsh realities that surround them.  Both are at once foreign and strikingly familiar.  Both use death as a backdrop and draw humor from the deep, dark well of dysfunctional kin, resulting in laughter mixed with the occasional wince.

 

In Dividing the Estate, currently staged by Ensemble Theatre, squabbling siblings meet over dinner at the family's once elegant mansion to discuss splitting up the family estate into individual portions and selling off its assets.  

 

Lewis (Robert Hawkes) requires the money to pay off the debt from his self-indulgent hobbies-alcohol, gambling and very young women.  Mary Jo (Valerie Young) wishes to live the pampered existence in which she and her spoiled daughters (Kayla McDonald and Emily Pucell) have grown accustomed despite her clueless husband's (Mark Cipra) bad investments and pending bankruptcy.

 

Their manipulative, octogenarian mother, Stella (Bernice Bolek), wants what's always been in the family to stay in the family and under her strict control.  She is supported by her other daughter, Lucille (Anne McEnvoy), and grandson, Son (Aaron Elersich), who have devoted their lives to maintaining the estate and caring for the cantankerous Stella. 

 

Fueling the family's desperation and the play's relevance is the fact that the once generous estate has been significantly devalued amidst the economic downturn of the 1980s that devastated towns built on farming and oil.  A whopping inheritance tax doesn't help.

 

Serving to remind the family of the mean world at the gates is outsider Pauline (Laurel Johnson), a school teacher engaged to Son.  Reminding this privileged, lily-white family that the world has always been mean are the black servants working in the home (Renee Matthews-Jackson and Nadine Ndanema), led by 90-year-old Doug (Gregory White).

 

None of this takes, for this family is too easily distracted by local gossip and matters specific to their own needs, and too lost in reverie about family members who have come and gone.

 

These are genuinely unlikable characters behaving badly. Yet, Foote makes them interesting (Lewis, for example, is charming only when imbibing, which he does often) and, under Sarah May's insightful direction, they generate their share of sympathy.   

 

The pacing was a bit off on opening night to thoroughly mine all the understated humor in the script.  Yet, this is an engaging, very entertaining production thanks to the rich and uniformly superb performances from this cast.  

 

Particularly noteworthy is the performance turned in by McEvoy, whose Lucille anchors this family.  McEvoy brings just the right touch of southern gentility to this house full of greedy, combative children, but still manages to make known her character's own brand of pettiness.  Elersich does a fine job being the subservient, sacrificing grandson without losing his dignity or sense of self.

 

Sara Masterson, as Lewis' latest sweet, young fling, is absolutely delightful upon her arrival in the closing moments of the play.  With very little stage-time and few lines, she effectively demonstrates that the more things change, the more they remain the same.

 

All this takes place on the intimate Brooks Theatre stage, made even more claustrophobic by Ron Newell's furniture saturated living room locale.  The family is literally trapped in this refined but decaying, familial yet formal environment, reinforcing Foote's message that home is where the heartache is.

 

Dividing the Estate continues through December 12 at the Cleveland Play House's Brooks Theatre, 8500 Euclid Avenue in Cleveland.  For tickets, which range from $10 to $20, call 216-321-2930 or visit info at ensemble-theatre.org.
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