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Writing for Us
A CurtainUp Review
Our Leading Lady
By Elyse Sommer
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Fate has gifted us with the opportunity to perform in the Nation's capital the very week the war has ended. As Mr. Lincoln has been assured of his place in history, so we have a chance to be part of this glorious moment.— Laura, not realizing yet that Lincoln's attendance at the company's Our American Cousin will lead to the tragedy that will end up being Laura Keene's one claim to thespian fame.
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Kate Mulgrew in Our Leading Lady
(Photo: Joan Marcus)
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As a hi-jinx but loving send-up of thespians, Our Leading Lady has a fair amount of laughs but too often it leans towards stereotypical ho-hums. As a highly dramatic footnote to the national tragedy in which Keene and her fellow actors played inadvertent roles, the script fails to integrate the serious with the silly.
None of the above is to say that Kate Mulgrew isn't fully committed to her imperious grand dame role. In fact, seeing her in the lead is something of a double whammy: with Mulgrew playing Kathryn Hepburn playing Laura Keene. (Her physical resemblance to Hepburn was used to good advantage in the biographical solo show, Tea at 5).
Lynne Meadow, who directed The Tale of the Allergist's Wife (review) with enough zip for it to transfer to Broadway, has done little to help Busch make this a more pungent and coherent play. Granted, she's staged it to look terrific. Santo Loquasto's set with its Ford Theater proscenium is lit for maximum Victorian atmosphere by Brian MacDevitt's lighting and Jane Greenwood has dressed the whole cast to luscious perfection. However, instead of guiding the actors to move beyond being stock backstage types especially after the tragedy we all see coming takes place, Meadow seems to have actually encouraged them to play their parts at one, over-the-top pitch that can be summed up with a single adjective: dashing for leading man and the leading lady's secret lover Harry Hawk (Maxwell Caulfield). . . venomous for has-been Southern Belle actress Verbena deChamblay (Kristine Nielson). . .effete for her husband Gavin de Chamblay (Reed Birney). . .dotty for the Maude Bentley (BarbaraBryne), the company's oldest member . . .adorable for ingenue Clementine Smith (Amy Rutberg, who really is adorable). . .naive for W. J. Ferguson (Billy Whelan), the company gofer and understudy . . .insightful for Laura's servant , a runaway slave who gets away with her Madame Wu Chan pose because of Laura and the other actors are too self-absorbed to really look at her (Anne Duquesnay makes the most dimensional transition to a more serious role). . .blustery for Major Hapwood (J. R. Horn) who is arrives late (and fairly unnecessarily) in the play to investigate the actors' possible connection to the assassination.
While Laura Keene's main claim to enduring fame is that it was her production of a melodrama called Our American Cousin that was playing at Ford's Theater the night Lincoln was shot, the British born actress was indeed interesting enough to warrant having a play written about her. She made history ten years before the Lincoln assassination, as the first female theater manager and introduced matinee performances to enable unescorted females to go to the theater. Though Busch clearly admired and researched her carefully, it's too bad that he couldn't have written a more complex and less scattershot play to bring her back to life for theater goers.
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OUR LEADING LADY By Charles Busch Directed by Lynne Meadow Cast: Reed Birney (Gavin De Chamblay), Barbara Bryne (Maude Bentley), Maxwell Caulfield (Harry Hawk), Ann Duquesnay (Madame Wu-Chan), J. R. Horne (Major Hopwood), Kate Mulgrew (Laura Keene), Kristine Nielsen (Verbena De Chamblay), Amy Rutberg (Clementine Smith) and Billy Wheelan (W. J. Ferguson). Sets: Santo Loquasto Costumes: Jane Greenwood Lights: Brian MacDevitt Sound: Scott Lehrer Wigs: Tom Watson Makeup: Angelina Avallone Fight Director: J. David Brimmer Running Time: 2 hours with one intermission Manhattan Theater Club, City Center, Stage 2, 131 West 55th Street, (212) 581-1212. From 2/22/07 to 4/22/07; opening 3/20/07. Tue — Sun at 7:30pm; Sat & Sun at 2:30pm Tickets: $50. Reviewed by Elyse Sommer at March 21st performance |
Easy-on-the budget super gift for yourself and your musical loving friends. Tons of gorgeous pictures.
Leonard Maltin's 2007 Movie Guide
At This Theater
Leonard Maltin's 2005 Movie Guide
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