[NEohioPAL] Final 4 performances of ROMANTIC FOOLS & another Rave Review -- Sold out last Saturday

[Neil Thackaberry]

*Dating and mating, 21st-century style*



Published: Friday, January 21, 2011 1:07 AM EST

Reviewed by FRAN HELLER
Contributing Writer

Men and women – you can’t live with them, and you can’t live without them.

Playwright Rich Orloff dissects this truism in “Romantic Fools,” a wacky
comedy about male-female relationships and looking for love, 21st-century
style. It’s at Actors’ Summit through Jan. 30.

In a series of short scenes, Orloff satirizes the games men and women play
in the ongoing war between the sexes. Some vignettes are funnier than
others, and a few fall flatter than a sour note. But there’s more than meets
the eye in Orloff’s screwball take on dating and mating. Alternately comical
and crude, insightful and off-the-wall, beneath the laugh lines lies a keen
observer of human nature.

In this age of online dating, singles’ events and personal ads, the
playwright suggests that men and women are looking for Mr. and Ms. Perfect.
In skit after skit, Orloff dismantles this fantasy of a perfect relationship
with slapstick and bite.

The couple of this zany piece are Andrew (Keith Stevens) and Lori (Shani
Ferry). Both Stevens and Ferry are regular Actors’ Summit company members,
and they play off each other hand in glove and with perfect comic timing.

Direction of the dozen skits is divvied up between four directors, yet it
feels seamless in these two actors’ variable portraits. Directors are Neil
Thackaberry, Shawn Galligan, Daniel Taylor and Peter Voinovich.

MaryJo Alexander’s rendition of a contemporary single’s pad, painted in
vivid geometric splashes of color and coupled with Kevin Rutan’s psychedelic
lighting, is mood-perfect.

In the prologue, Lori and Andrew mutually lament the difficulty of meeting a
guy or gal. In the first scene, “Find Me a Primitive Man,” Lori gets fixed
up on a blind date. When her date turns out to be a caveman draped in
leopard skin and bearing a bouquet of flowers and a slab of raw meat, the
two negotiate the terrain of “communication” through a game of charades.
Thumping his chest, grunting, and prancing about as he mimics killing and
foraging for food, Stevens is riotously funny as a Neanderthal with
feelings.

Underscoring the buffoonery is the clever notion that since primitive times,
communication between men and women has had its challenges.

In “Nightmare with a Sexy Skirt,” Andrew meets the date from hell, a needy,
manipulative woman who attracts and repels him like an alternating current.
One of the funniest moments in the show occurs when Andrew nears the
bedroom, and an alarm bell goes off.

In “One Man’s Secret Desire,” Andrew indulges his secret fantasy by hiring a
call girl (Ferry at her sexiest) from an escort service. But in a reversal
of expectations, what Andrew desires is “dull” sex (as opposed to “kinky”).
“It’s the desire guys are most afraid to admit to modern women,” he says.

There’s poignancy and humor in “The Stepford Guy,” in which the woman
complains that living with Mr. Perfect is not a normal marriage. Stevens is
a riot as a hopelessly contrite husband struggling to pick a fight with his
increasingly exasperated wife.

In “Nice Tie” (one of my favorites), a man and a woman meet at a bar. When
he offers to buy her a drink, she refuses, launching into a monologue about
all the things that can go wrong in a marriage. This segment is about the
fear of commitment and risk-taking: Whereas she fears their marriage might
turn out badly (adultery, divorce, and two dysfunctional kids), he says it
might just turn out the opposite (staying faithful and raising two Merit
Scholars.)

A game of arm wrestling serves as a stimulus for sex in “Power is the
Greatest Aphrodisiac of Them All.” One of the funniest scenes is “Spaghetti
Overture,” in which Andrew has buried Lori’s engagement ring in a gigantic
mound of pasta. It’s pure shtick, but Stevens is such a consummate mugger,
that I laughed in spite of such silliness.

The sweetest vignette, “Bride & Groom,” is also the last. Ferry is adorable
as a pouting bride who gets cold feet at her own wedding and refuses to go
through with the ceremony. (Shades of Neil Simon’s “Plaza Suite” and Stephen
Sondheim’s “Company.”) Lori demurs because she’s afraid they’ll get divorced
just like much of the rest of her family. The couple argue and decide to
call the whole thing off until they hear the wedding march and happily
change their minds.

“What fools these mortals be.” says Shakespeare’s Puck about the irrational
nature of human love. “Romantic Fools” proves Puck’s observation as pointed
as ever.

For mature audiences.

WHAT: “Romantic Fools”

WHERE: Actors’ Summit, Greystone Hall, 6th Floor, 103 S. High St., Akron

WHEN: Through Jan. 30

TICKETS & INFO: 330-374-7568 or www.actorssummit.org
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