HEIDI CHRONICLES OPENS CMTC SEASON AT THE NEXT STAGE
Roselyn Hallett, Juliet Heller
HEIDI CHRONICLES, THE by Wendy Wasserstein, Directed by Brian Katz. Custom Made Theatre Company (CMTC), The Next Stage,
HEIDI CHRONICLES OPENS CMTC SEASON AT THE NEXT STAGE
Custom Made Theatre Company (CMTC) that began in Boston in 1996, moving to San Francisco in 1998 establishing themselves in a second floor venue at Off Market, has found a spacious and comfortable new quarters at The Next Stage to begin their 2009-20010 season. They have dipped into their archives retrieving their 2006 production of The Heidi Chronicles that received rave reviews. It is an excellent choice since Wasserstein’s Pulitzer and Tony Prize winning play dovetails with CMTC’s commitment to producing plays with social conscience.
To depict men’s attitude toward women Wasserstein opens the play with successful art historian Heidi Holland giving a lecture on the lack of recognition of female painters from ''the dawn of history to the present.'' She then relies on flashbacks to delineate the timeline of Heidi’s 24-year Candide-type journey from high school activist to fully awakened feminist. That timeline contains historical political and cultural events that shape her personality. Along the way, her life long friend Susan offers support and advice on which ideal to grasp, those of women’s collectives, power lunches or the Boomer Generation at the end of the 20th century.
Heidi’s male relationships include arrogant, opportunistic Scoop Rosenbaum who cons her into a sexual liaison and Peter Patrone a charming, gay pediatrician. Scoop becomes highly successful as the editor of “Boomer” magazine that is the gospel of the 1980s baby-boomer generation. At the end of the play, Heidi has an epiphany that she describes in a speech of ''Women, Where Are We Going?'' at her high school alumnae luncheon. With sudden intuition, she recognizes that the external pressures must be discarded and replaced by self reliance.
With the retrieval The Heidi Chronicles from their archive, they brought along Leah Abrams and Fred Pitts who received accolades for that staging to recreate the roles of Hiedi Holland and Peter Patrone. The company engaged seasoned performer Dan Wilson to play Scoop Rosenbaum and up and coming thespian Kelly Rinehart for the Susan Johnson role.To support these major roles, Wasserstein created 14 characters played by four actors as an ensemble. Creating a cohesive ensemble requires definition of individual characters while being an integral part of the whole. These two factors are only partially accomplished thus interfering with the flow of the play.
Brian Katz uses directorial conceits that are elusive and may not be grasped by the audience. For example, rather than use music to delineate the time changes, Katz elects to hang esoteric paintings ( created by artist Nicola McCarthy) by female artists specific to the era and with each scene change one or more of the paintings are carried off stage. Without diluting play’s relevancy and social impact, Katz mines moments of pathos and humor to deliver an interesting thoughtful evening in the theater. Running time 2 hours and 30 minutes.
Kedar K. Adour, MD
Courtesy of www.theatreworldinternetmagazine.com