It's a "Happy Birthday" when Addie comes out of her shell

Being drunk and lovesick may not be an ideal combination.

In Anita Loos's "Happy Birthday," at Theatre Row;s Beckett Theatre in a TACT production through April 13th, the combination proves magical.

Mary Bacon as Addie Bemis and Todd Gearhart as Paul Bishop in "Happy Birthday." Photo by Hunter Canning.

The mousy librarian, Miss Addie Bemis (Mary Bacon) is lovestruck. She shows up at Gail Hosmer's (Karen Ziemba) Jersey Mecca Cocktail Lounge to warn Paul Bishop (Todd Gearhart) that her father Homer (Anderson Matthews) intends him harm. Paul is the object of Miss Bemis's affections.

Don't know how many of us thrive through liberal doses of alcoholic beverages, but Addie Bemis comes into her own the more she drinks. Her priggishness melts and her confidence builds. As the evening goes on, she is sure she can get Mr. Bishop away from Miss Maude Carson (Victoria Mack.)

Addie's barroom full of new friends, and the audience, are all pulling for her. The bartender, Herman (Ron McClary) gives her godfatherly advice. She sings, she dances, but can she prevail over Miss Carson's obvious charms?

The large cast to a man and woman are as delightful as the lighthearted, but savvy, romance in "Happy Birthday." Mary Bacon is especially poweful, as she carries Addie seamlessly from stiff to giddy.

The TACT's "Happy Birthday" is a gift.

For more information on "Happy Birthday," please visit http://tactnyc.org/
 

Anxiety Looms On "A Summer Day"

Karen Allen, surrounded by memories, in "A Summer Day" at the Cherry Lane. Photo © Sandra Coudert

Angst, Scandanavian-style, made popular by Ingmar Bergman in our youth, and gently mocked by Woody Allen, is back in Jon Fosse's "A Summer Day."

"A Summer Day," at the Cherry Lane Theatre, through November 25th, is getting its first-time premiere  in New York City in this affectionate production by  Rattlestick Playwrights Theater. 

"A Summer Day,"  takes anxiety and sadness to the brink. By an informal count, the words "anxious" and "sad" were celebrated more than a dozen times in the text of Jon Fosse's play in director Sarah Cameron Sunde's translation. 

Melancholia,  bolstered by boredom, looks to be a Norwegian pasttime, seconded only by going out onto rough waters.

Samantha Soule with McCaleb Burnett in "A Summer Day." Photo © Sandra Coudert. 

Asle (McCaleb Burnett) likes it out there in his little boat. His wife (Karen Allen as Older Woman, and Samantha Soule as Younger Woman) finds it scary. As the play opens, the Older Woman stands at the window looking out at the pier. Her Older Friend (Pamela Shaw), visiting on this bright summer day, much as she had  on a much gloomier day years ago (Younger Friend, played by Maren Bush) when Asle went off to the water's edge. Never to return.

Abandoned in her lovely house, the Older Woman lives a desolate life reminiscing about that day and watching the bay.

Much of the tension in "A Summer Day" comes from waiting for the other shoe to drop. It never does. As Karen Allen's character narrates the story, we bait our breath for something unexpected to happen.

A long, somewhat tedious, yet oddly engrossing tone-poem of mourning and loss, "A Summer Day" is lovingly executed. 

For more information about "A Summer Day," and a schedule of performance, please visit www.rattlestick.org.