Incompleat: What went wrong at Circuit Playhouse

So many things are left unfinished. This blog, for example.

I'm not at all happy with my review of Compleat Female Stage Beauty in this week's issue of The Flyer. The passage about clown roles doesn't say at all what I intended to say, and its my fault. I'll link it when it comes online.

Then there's the actual Circuit Playhouse production of Compleat Female Stage Beauty, which feels compleat-ly unfinished and bumpy around its frayed edges.

The set-- a shapeless bridge of platforms--looks like an afterthought.

And in the center of it all there's Jerre Dye and Michael Gravois, two exceptional actors doing some of the best work they've ever done. If you haven't watched this video yet, do. You'll see exactly what I mean.



U of M undergrad Ann Marie Gideon is also doing some exceptional work, and that brings me to the chief source of my disappointment in this week's review.

Of all the Shakespearean clowns in this show, Gideon's Nell is the only one presented in three dimensions, with any real character arc. The rest are broadly acted stooges and stereotypes. That's the point I garbled.

I'm a fan of director Dave Landis' work, usually. But for all of its potential, this very funny and mostly engaging show just isn't one of his better efforts.

Still, well worth checking out.

Fin

Are You Being Served?

Room Service, a thinly drawn but potentially hilarious comedy from the 1930's opens

Marques Brown,

Stephen Garrett,
Henry McDaniel
and Tony Isbell
in
Room Service at
Theatre Memphis.

at Theatre Memphis this weekend.

The show follows the misadventures of Gordon Miller, a theatre producer and confidence man who's producing Godspeed, a sprawling American epic that begins with the sweeping pageantry of the Revolutionary war, and culminates with the social realism of a coal miners strike in the early 20th-Century. Miller and his cronies think Godspeed, might be a big hit, if the theatre company's massive room service bills at the Times Square Hotel don't tank the production first.

After a successful 1937 run on Broadway, RKO produced a film version of Room Service starring the Marx Brothers. The show's gags can be very funny, as proven by countless revivals over the past half century, but they didn't fit well with the Marx Brothers' well established personas, and the film is widely considered to rank high on a short list of the zainy siblings' lowest achievements.

Theatre Memphis has assembled a top notch cast for its production of Room Service. Marques Brown, Tony Isbell, Henry McDaniel, and Stephen Garrett all take major roles. It is being staged by TM's artistic director Kell Christie.

Think of it as a vintage warm up for Playhouse on the Square's production of The Producers

Beauty & the Beat Down

This clip of Jerre Dye and Michael Gravois in Compleat Female Stage Beauty at Circuit Playhouse looks promising.

Enter stage left. Thunder. Lightning. Rain.

This is only a test post. But if you stumble by, feel free to leave a comment.