[NEohioPAL] 4 Critics - 4 Great Reviews -- MANNING UP at Actors' Summit

[Neil Thackaberry]

MANNING UP by Sean Christopher Lewis at Actors' Summit.


Stevens and Voinovich expertly play off their characters’ differences,
including Donnie’s squeamishness and Raymond’s somewhat graphic references
to sex and pregnancy.

“You’re like an idiot savant of manliness,” Raymond tells Donnie in one of
the play’s best lines.

In this emotionally satisfying comedy, Raymond and Donnie, like many close
friends, end up being the best form of therapy for each other.

Kerry Clawson, Akron Beacon Journal


Peter Voinovich (Raymond) and Keith Stevens (Donnie), who are real-life
brothers-in-law and have recently gone through the throes of new
fatherhood, have a great time on stage.  They both develop clear
characters.  Stevens, whose mobile face often reflects the “deer caught in
the headlights look” of a timid academic, unused to operating without a
lesson plan, is excellent.  Voinovich, the bigger, more gruff of the two,
rants and raves with great buffoonery.

Roy Berko


Director Neil Thackaberry helped his actors develop distinct characters.
The stage movement could easily become redundant with only two actors on
the stage, but Thackaberry solves that problem with many different
diversions. Voinovich is loud and boisterous as the soon-to-be father. He
finds the laughs and goes for them. Stevens is a rock solid actor. He makes
his character more fragile than Voinovich’s. But, he lets us know that
beneath that fragility he’s tough and strong.

David Ritchey, West Side Leader


As for the actors, they are great. They are able to pull off the delicate
balance of false bravado and true feelings necessary to make the play work.
Peter Voinovich as Ray shifts from braggart to a man of sensitive feelings
while his cohort in crime, Donnie, starts out timid but is able to harness
the inner manliness within. In the end, their balance of timid and bravado
balance out in each of them.

Mark Horning, Examiner.com


Now through June 2.  Call 330-374-7568.
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