Review of PRIVATE JOKES, PUBLIC PLACES Review of SHOW BOAT
PRIVATE LIVES, PUBLIC PLACES
Reviewed by Jeffrey R Smith of the San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle
To say that PRIVATE JOKES, PUBLIC PLACES by Oren Safdie is the funniest comedy to be seen anywhere in the Bay Area is an understatement.
To say is it is the best comedy of the year is more understatement.
As Bay Area critic with nearly twenty years invested in Bay Area theater houses, let me say this: PRIVATE JOKES, PUBLIC PLACES is the funniest, cleverest, most intelligent comedy I have seen since setting foot on the Pacific Rim.
I will bet both my IBM Selectric and my Smith Corona Galaxis Deluxe that this play will open on Broadway and will be targeted for botching by Hollywood.
Safdie is the first genius comic playwright to emerge in the current millennium.
Let us hope he is as prolific as Shaw.
If you were wondering who is going to inherit Tom Stoppard's seat in the Algonquin Room Safdie would be the best bet.
Safdie knows and writes subtlety, nuance, insinuation.
Try to imagine a play that is so funny—and funny is a poor choice of words: it is cliché—that you can dampen an entire bandana sized handkerchief with tears of laugher.
Then visualize a play that blurs your vision with tears of laughter as you mentally revisit it while driving home.
Then picture a play that has you laughing at the breakfast table the next morning.
Don't expect slap-stick, farce, sit-com, satire, parody, burlesque or glib repartee.
This is fresh comedy that is so well written it does not leave tracks when is gallops across the stage.
M.J. Kang is the pivotal jewel imbedded in the creative forehead of this stroke of genius.
Kang is endearing for any number of reasons.
The character—Margaret—that she and director Barbara Damashek have created is absolutely precious: a diligent, earnest, intelligence, articulate, idealistic architectural student with a well researched plan for a swimming pool complex.
Her malefactors are the nefarious professors Colin and Erhardt—superbly played by Charles Dean and Robert Parsons—both of who try for all the obvious Freudian reasons to rip her project to shreds.
Margaret holds her ground, retaining her aplomb, as she defends her thesis project from assaults by mediocrity, pompousness, arrogance and irrelevance.
If you see only one comedy in the next ten years, see this one.
If PRIVATE JOKES, PUBLIC PLACES does not make you weak from laughter, might I suggest a boxed DVD set of FRIENDS: The First Ten Banal Seasons.
For tickets, visit the web site at www.auroratheatre.org or call the Aurora Theatre of Berkeley at 510.843.4822.
U.S. Naval Aviator and Lieutenant Commander Retired
Math Teacher at Encinal High School A.U.S.D.
San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle
Sidewalk Politician and Arm Chair Liberal
See what's free at AOL.com.
SHOW BOAT
Reviewed by Jeffrey R Smith of the San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle
Broadway by the Bay of San Mateo is currently staging what could arguably be the finest musical available anywhere in the bay area.
Start with a heart warming romantic novel by Edna Ferber, add the music of Jerome Kern and the lyrics of Oscar Hammerstein II, and you have the makings of an epic musical.
Bring the show to life with great actors, singers and dancers and you have a showpiece.
On the surface, SHOWBOAT is a thick slice of Americana pie: the vibrancy of the Mississippi River trade and traffic, hopeful entrepreneurialism, dreams of romance and stardom, and the music that celebrates the American Dream.
But if one looks and listens beneath the vibrantly colored costumes, the brightly painted set and the sweet loves songs, one can sense the persistent dark truth that haunts this fluvial American landscape.
The signature tune: Ol' Man River reprises itself several times in the play reminding us of the Mississippi River Basin's dark side: if life on the river seemed easy it was only because it was resting on the backs of others, "You an'me, we sweat an' strain, Body all achin' an' racket wid pain, Tote dat barge! Lif' dat bale! . . . Ah gits weary, An' sick of tryin', Ah'm tired of livin', An' skeered of dyin', Colored folks work while de white folks play . . . Pullin' dose boats from de dawn to sunset, Gittin' no rest till de judgement day . . . Don't look up, An' don't look down, You don' dast make De white boss frown, Bend your knees, An'bow your head, An' pull date rope Until you' dead."
The engine that drove life on the Mississippi was not the steam engine that turned the giant paddle wheels, it was the cheap labor provided by the captive audience of disenfranchised African-Americans.
In the closing scene all the loose ends seem to be tied up, Gaylord and Magnolia are reunited, Captain Andy is rich and secure, and Kim is a rising a starlet.
Only one thread is left untied: the very catalyst or vehicle whose sacrifices and misfortunes made it all happen: Julie LaVerne.
Twice, Julie gives up her career to the advantage of Magnolia: once on the Cotton Blossom when she runs afoul with Jim Crow Laws regarding miscegenation and has to flee the onerous maw of the law, and again in Chicago when she deliberately gets herself fired so that the desperate, deserted Magnolia can get her job at the Trocadero Nightclub.
Julie's devastating losses translate directly into Magnolia's gains: they are the first two rungs on Magnolia's ladder to success.
Julie "the mulatto" is last seen on stage holding out an alms cup to indifferent whites on the busy streets of Chicago.
Strange that the collaborative plot line of Kern, Hammerstein and Ferber makes no provisions for restoring the fortunes of the big hearted Julie.
But then, this apparent oversight could be the metaphor and the kernel of truth that is secretly stowed onboard the SHOW BOAT.
If you attend one musical this year, the tickets should read: SHOW BOAT.
For reservations call the Broadway by the Bay Box Office at 650-579-5565 or visit www.broadwaybythebay.org .
U.S. Naval Aviator and Lieutenant Commander Retired
Math Teacher at Encinal High School A.U.S.D.
San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle
Sidewalk Politician and Arm Chair Liberal
See what's free at AOL.com.