16
Jul
2008
In the Playcrafters Barn Theatre's current production of Crimes of the Heart, Ashley Hoskins portrays Babe, the youngest and most eccentric of playwright Beth Henley's Magrath sisters, and the actress is like a nervous breakdown on legs.
This is meant as the highest of praise.
On Friday night, I attended a comedic farce that featured slamming doors, mistaken identities, gunshots, an unhelpful cop, a heavily accented mobster, an attractive woman getting sloppy drunk, and a finale that found characters staring with amazement at a briefcase filled with cash.
A busier-than-usual weekend dictated that I catch a final dress rehearsal for the Playcrafters Barn Theatre's Our Town on Monday, and at the well-attended preview, I found myself seated behind two couples who chuckled while perusing the program - their amusement stemmed from realizing that Thornton Wilder's play would be produced in three acts, and, as one of the women laughed, "We'll be here past our bedtime."
Offhand, I can think of no type of play more annoying than one that won't stop insisting on how clever it is.
