BE YOURSELF!  SWIM THE MOAT!

ONCE UPON A MATTRESS
Circle Players
Thursday, 09 April 2009

Circle Players has often been recognized in Nashville’s community theatre scene for its large-scale, large-cast, multi-costumed and elaborate sett-ed productions, and Once Upon a Mattress is no exception.  Well, technically it is an exception.  Mattress, like its recent predecessor, Titanic the Musical, is more cohesive, engaging, and entertaining.  Plus (unlike the death-riddled Titanic) – it’s a hell of a lot more fun!

This is due in part to the choreographic feats of Kate Adams Johnson, who also choreographed Titanic, Evita, Pirates of Penzance, and likely several other shows I’ve enjoyed recently, to which I’m sure my growing pile of theatre programs will attest; theatre companies in town are certainly blessed to have acquired her talents.  As I was watching Mattress, I realized how much there was to see in each number, and I often wanted to see it again so I could try and catch it all.  Their version of the Spanish Panic (I won’t give away what happens!) is not my particular cup of tea, but then I’m an old fuddy-duddy.  It is astoundingly well-performed, and the younger set will rave over it (pun intended.)....

Mattress is another exception, in that for the first time in several productions, the band does not completely overpower the vocalists.  With other shows, I thought it was just an unfortunate quality of that theatre – but this production proves that the band levels could be more controlled.  Actually, in some numbers, the music is a smidge too quiet.  Any chance of a happy medium?  I’ll go ask my psychic.....

There are some truly exception-al (!) actors on the Looby stage.   Lynda Cameron Bayer, as Aggravaine, is  quite rightly Queen of all she surveyed, and gives as fascinating and lively a performance as I’ve come to expect from her.  Gabe Gabriel as Dauntless, is consistently adorable.  Watching him, I get the sense that Mummy’s apron strings had been wound around his neck a wee bit too long, cutting off the oxygen supply to his brain!  As Winnifred, ....Cathy Street is honest and quirky, and naturally lovable.  However, hers is the only singing voice that the band threatens to
overpower.  Of the King’s retinue, the Jester (Nancy Whitehead) stands out as the one to watch, but she, the Minstrel, and the King, are a charming trio that often made me smile.   David Williams and Emily Webb (Henry and Larkin) are masters of their craft as I have witnessed in a number of past production.  These two could have been the perfect pertrarchan sweetlings of the show.  Yet their characters seem mismatched as a couple, as if there is very little real love between them.  Perhaps
it is just my fuddy-duddiness again, but I longed for them to have been directed toward a more classic portrayal.   Rather than Romeo and Juliet, or Hero and Claudio, I imagined Billy Jo growling for his beer, and the barefoot and pregnant Mindy Sue going to fetch it for him.......

Although my fuddy and my duddy reared their cooperative ugly heads a few times, I thoroughly enjoyed the show, I wish I could sneak in again  to be wowed by the Queen and charmed by the Prince and awed by the choreography.   

TRUDY’S TRUTH IN THEATRE:

As children, we all listen to fairy tales and read our lives into them, but we also want to accomplish our lives as a virtual fairy tale even when we are adults.  We never really abandon fairy tales, do
we?  Who doesn’t want a happy ending?  Plus, they exhibit what it meant to be lovely or gallant and/or how to become kings and queens by good kismet.  To read a fairy tale is to go along the storybook path to happiness; to watch it unfold on stage in a twisted, bizarre, non-standardized way is also a treat because I believe that the fairy tale is not only about happiness, but the means to obtain a little bit of happiness within oneself.  Which is why I like the Winnifred character so much - so brazen. unsophisticated , and charmingly cheeky is she that she swarms the castle moat in her excitement to meet her prince!  And is she okay with this?  Yes she is.  Let this be a lesson to you, my
fairy-tale reading little princesses - be yourself!

If you think your personal schedule will not allow you to see a show this Easter weekend, let Once Upon a Mattress be your exception.