"Waitress" @ Playhouse Square, Oct. 17-Nov. 5

“Waitress” @ Playhouse Square, October 17--November 5, 2017

Review by Laura Kennelly

“If music food pie be the food of love, play on” [alt-Shakespeare]. That could be the motif for “Waitress,” the first 2017-2018 Playhouse Square Broadway series production. Pie features prominently in this musical directed by Tony-Award winner Diane Paulus and featuring songs by Sara Bareilles and book by Jessie Nelson. It’s based on the 2007 film “Waitress” by Adrienne Shelly.

This finely-crafted show in the Connor Palace opens the national tour of the Broadway hit that’s still playing in NYC. We may be in Cleveland, but we might as well be in New York as far as cast, sets, and performances go. “Waitress” revels in a slickly presented and sassy mix, blending song, great sets, recipes for imaginary pies, dancing, and sex into a sprightly musical event.

It doesn’t do to think too much about the soap-opera plot.

Our heroine, small-town gal Jenna (the multi-talented Desi Oakley) works as a waitress in Joe’s  Diner. She’s a kind soul and a genius pie-creator (one for every mood) who suddenly finds out she’s pregnant. Her abusive husband, Earl (played with forceful charm by Nick Bailey) and her selfish obstetrician, Dr. Pomatter (played with facile kindness by Bryan Fenkart) turn out to be equally egotistical.

But that’s all right because, despite her poor taste in men, she’s got a fabulous diner “family.” Her wonderful and funny fellow waitresses, Dawn (Lenne Klingaman) and Becky (Charity Angel Dawson), offer her love and support as they go about filling orders and coffee cups. Klingaman’s Dawn, a cute little nerd who snorts when she laughs, even finds a soulmate when she’s encouraged to be kind to the shy Ogie (an equally nerdy and awkwardly attractive Jeremy Morse).

Dawson’s Becky is a warm-hearted, full-throated singer who knows what she wants (that would be diner cook Cal, played with bossy humor by Ryan G. Dunkin). Also important to the story, cafe patron Old Joe (Larry Marshall, who plays grumpy and kindly with equal aplomb).

We also meet Lulu, the result of Jenna’s unplanned pregnancy and, as it turns out, the true love that she’s been seeking all along. The delightful five-year-old Harper Schmid played Lulu opening night. Meredith Wakefield also plays Lulu.

And cheers to the multi-faceted ensemble who switch with ease from cafe patrons to hospital personnel, including Baldwin Wallace graduate Kyra Kennedy as Dr. Mrs. Pomatter,  who makes one wonder, what was the doc thinking, fooling around with a patient? (Today he’d be sued for sure).

Other ensemble members include Skyler Adams, Law Terrell Dunford, Patrick Dunn, James Hogan, David Hughey, Arica Jackson, Emily Koch, Maiesha McQueen, Gerianne Perez, and Grace Stockdale who switch characters and scenery with impressive skill.

Set designer Scott Pask creates stage magic with rolling carts that take pies on and offstage. The stage itself is beautifully framed with pies in brightly lit cases. The small onstage band accompanies songs such as “Never Ever Getting Rid of Me” (Ogie’s cute love song) and “Everything Changes” (Jenna’s true love song). If you are lucky enough to hear a CD or recording of Sara Bareilles singing the songs she wrote you will find them sweetly plaintive and often quite clever. The lyrics include various recipes for pies, mostly large globs of sugar, butter, flour, and nostalgia. (Do not sit close to the speakers, however, as they were so loud where I was that I had trouble understanding the words. Sound is a problem not unique to the Connor Palace, but I wish it could be solved.)

Bottom Line: A well-acted and beautifully staged musical treat with a feel-good ending.

PS: But back to pies: There were mini-pies sold in the lobby and during intermission and apple pie scents pumped into the lobby as well. Well, who doesn’t love pie? It set a positive vibe. But then, I still treasure an earlier even better movie pie memory (no, not the notorious film you might be thinking of). In “Michael” (1996) John Travolta plays an angel who orders every pie in a roadside diner and urges Andie MacDowell to sing "I love pie." Now that’s happiness!

A Midsummer Night’s Dream @ Playhouse Square, October 6--November 5, 2017

Review by Laura Kennelly

Photo: Roger Mastroianni

The Great Lakes Theater Midsummer Night’s Dream gives us Shakespeare at his hilarious (and bawdy) best. In this enchanting Hanna Theatre production directed by Joseph Hanreddy every silly, comic element melds and spins into a dream. Under Hanreddy’s guidance, anachronisms (but who cares?) and traditional elements blend seamlessly to create a fresh look and a marvelous show.

The identity mix-up plot centers on what happens one summer night to a combination of royals and commoners. Theseus, Duke of Athens (a regal Nick Steen) is engaged to Queen of the Amazons, Hippolyta (an equally royal Jillian Kates). Commoners Nick Bottom (an awkward yet earnest David Anthony Smith) and his friends and fellow bumblers Peter Quince (Tom Ford), Francis Flue (Mack Shirilla), Robin Starveling (Jodi Dominick), and Tom Snout (Alex Syiek) strive to create a play for the wedding. (The play itself, which we also get to see, is a comic dessert served at drama’s end.)

Now add to the confusion, four young people who lead a complicated romantic life.

It seems Hermia (a pretty and flighty Michelle Pauker) has enraged her father Egeus (a blustering Aled Davies) because she’s fallen for Lysander (super-cool Corey Mach). Mach’s comic  slacker  Lysander couldn’t care less about being proper--he saunters out chewing gum--which he sticks on a beam and later retrieves--and he’s very hip (fist-bumps and all). It’s easy to see why Davies thinks him a bad match for his precious Hermia. Her father’s candidate, Demetrius (an earnest Jon Loya) also loves Hermia, but she scorns him. And then there’s Helena (Keri Rene Fuller) who has a crush on Demetrius. Fuller’s Helena shines as a prototype for all the nerdy beauties hidden behind glasses (she sports a giant pair) who also have a heart of gold.

One midsummer night, all individually venture into the forest that surrounds Athens.

Events that follow might serve as a caution about going into the forest after dark: It’s dangerous. Fairies do roam there and they are fiercer than one might imagine. They also love to tease mortals.

It seems that in the forest a less than happy Fairy King Oberon (Steen) and his Queen (Kates) have had a big spat. Oberon delegates his careless servant Puck (M. A. Taylor) to put flower juice into the eyes of first Lysander and then Demetrius. Since flower juice makes one love whomever they see first, they both fall for Helena. Oberon then plays the same prank on his wife, and she develops a passion for Bottom, who has been enchanted at Oberon’s command. Bottom now sports donkey ears, a tail, and other reputedly sexy parts of an ass. Kates and Smith make comic hay of the situation, creating genuinely funny scenes. Bottom has the time of his life.

After much romping and merriment, dawn comes, enchantment falls, and the lovers find their soulmates, there’s a wedding or two and, of course, all ends happily.

Costumes by Rachel Laritz, especially Titania’s sheer and sparkly gown worn with magnificent flair by Kates, create magic of their own. Scenic designer Scott Bradley, lighting designer Rick Martin, and sound designers and composers Rob Milburn and Michael Bodeen all add to the magic.

Bottom (as it were) Line: Absolutely delightful escape into Shakespeare at his funniest. It’s a magic world out there. Highly recommended.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream continues, alternating with The Hunchback of Notre Dame, through November 5 at the Hanna Theatre.

Waiting for Godot at Beck Center

Waiting for Godot @ The Beck Center, Oct. 6-Nov. 5

Review by Laura Kennelly

The Beck Center contemplates life in Waiting for Godot, Samuel Beckett’s post-World War II drama. Director Eric Schmeidl and the five-member cast offer an impressive and thought-provoking presentation.

The tight confines of the Beck’s Studio Theater are perfect for this famous, yet annoyingly existentialist, play that dares to question man’s purpose. Yes, it’s Serious Drama with capital letters, but it’s also quite funny in spots (even if you are the only one laughing at times).

Beckett, like others of his era, strove to see life’s essentials (think Picasso’s later works featuring skulls, roses, abstract landscapes). It is in such a barren landscape, created by Aaron Benson (set designer), and Trad A. Burns (lighting designer) that our play opens. We see Vladimir/Didi (a sympathetic Michael Mauldin) wandering around singing and talking to himself. He is soon joined by Estragon/Gogo (an energetic, yet practical William Hoffman). Both are seniors who have been together for years and they are still waiting for the promised appointment with Mr. Godot.

Pozzo (Brian Pedaci) and his slave Lucky (Allan Byrne) join them, sometimes duplicating personality dynamics apparent in Vladimir and Estragon. Both Pedaci and Byrne enliven the stage when they appear--adding an additional note of physical comedy. Effectively switching between being assertive and scared, Jake Spencer, as “Boy” brings them hope with the message that “Mr. Godot” says he will come “tomorrow.”

But the show belongs to Vladimir and Estragon as the two old friends bicker, embrace, philosophize, and wait for Godot. Nothing happens, really, except (this is a big “except”) the purpose of life is stripped of any other purpose than to meet Godot (who some might assume is “God”).

Bottom Line: I didn’t think I’d be recommending this show because its thesis is depressing, but I find I must: This outstanding production quietly and strongly reminds us that life is, indeed, absurd. Beckett asks that we devise our reasons for embracing it anyway.

Tickets are available at beckcenter.org or by calling 216 521 2540.

Hunchback of Notre Dame at Great Lakes Theater @ Playhouse Square

The Hunchback of Notre Dame @ Playhouse Square, Sept. 29 to November 4, 2017

Review by Laura Kennelly

Photo by Roger Mastroianni.

The Hanna Great Lakes Theater’s opening show this season is The Hunchback of Notre Dame, a Disney-film-inspired musical that didn’t make it to Broadway. Director Victoria Bussert’s signature touch is shown in her vibrant use of the Hanna’s cozy space and her employment of a wonderfully talented cast. But even Bussert’s talent can’t dissipate the awkward story created by this Disneyfication of Victor Hugo’s novel. (“Disneyfication” here means simplifying a 19th-century 800-plus page gothic romance into a single story that argues for being kind to strangers and to those weaker than oneself.)

In short, there’s an outcast in the bell tower of the venerable Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. That’s the church bell ringer Quasimodo, a deformed yet exceedingly strong man who hides above the streets lest people mock him. Below there’s another outcast, one of a tribe of gypsies, the beautiful Esmeralda. He falls in love with her because she is kind, but unlike in Beauty and the Beast, she does not fall in the same way for him. That’s all right though, they are allies against the ignorance and prejudice of the people around them.

The versatile Corey Mach, as Quasimodo, creates a believable outcast (and has the best song in the show, “Out There”). Keri René Fuller conveys the beauty and grace of Esmeralda, the gypsy girl who befriends the lonely Quasimodo. Tom Ford offers a nuanced view of the conflicted Dom Claude Frollo, the Archdeacon of Notre Dame Cathedral.

It is, however, a charismatic Alex Syiek, as the King of the Gypsies, who seems to own the story and capture attention, adding both a combination of romance and menace. The exchanges the Hunchback has with the various gargoyles and angels who inhabit the bell tower also enliven the show. They lounge or stand in place and advise him about life and love.

Other members of the capable cast include Dan Hoy, Olivia Kaufmann, Aled Davies, Jon Loya, Mach Shirilla, M. A. Taylor, Derrick Cobey, Jillian Kates, Michelle Pauker, Mickey Ryan, David Anthony Smith, Nick Steen, and MacKenzie Wright. Baldwin Wallace University students led by Marc Weagraff sat mostly in the dark onstage, singing when needed as the church choir.

Scenic Designer Jeff Herrmann and lighting designer Mary Jo Dondlinger cleverly compressed a cathedral and a city onto the small stage.  Costume designer Martha Bromelmeier created an eye-catching way for the Hunchback to morph into his role as we watched. David Gotwald was sound designer and Joel Mercier led the small orchestra.

The music by Alan Menken, lyrics by Stephen Schwartz, book by Peter Parnell, are adequate and sound a lot like those in Beauty and the Beast, another cartoon turned into a stage musical. But Beauty and the Beast, with the same messages of love and tolerance, ends happily, whereas this one ends with the gruesome deaths of two who cared for each other. So what’s the point? Life is cruel? Priests are villains?

Bottom line: Such serious questions, ones that merit serious consideration by adults, are pitched here in such a superficial manner that even a young child might be mystified. This clash of elements, despite being presented by a great cast, left me feeling “meh” about it all.

For tickets or information go to GreatLakesTheater.org or call 216-640-8869.