Reviewed
by Claudia Perry
(Followed by an interview with Renee Taylor)
The
husband and wife team that brought us the Oscar nominated "Lovers and
Other Strangers", "It Had to Be You" and "Made for Each Other"
- Renee Taylor & Joe Bologna -- have brought their Off-Broadway comedy, "Bermuda
Avenue Triangle"
to the DuPont Theatre for a week of laughter and comedic schtick. Truly a
collaborative venture, the play was co-written and co-directed by the couple. Starring
Taylor, Bologna and Lainie Kazan, the cast is rounded out by Anne de Salvo, Manny Kleinmuntz and Rita McKenzie.
Two
elderly widows, one Jewish (Fanny Saperstein/Taylor) and the other an Italian
Catholic (Tess LaRuffa/Kazan), are set up in an upscale Las Vegas retirement
condo by their career oriented daughters. Trapped by years of unhappiness,
Fanny weeps like the Trevi Fountain and the unsmiling Tess does nothing but
complain. But that all changes when these two ladies cross paths with the charming
scoundrel, Johnny Paolucci who rocks both their worlds. Fanny and Tess undergo
a grand metamorphosis - from being two, baggy schmattaed, grey haired old
biddies, into a pair of glam-rock golden girls.
With
her little girl voice and impeccable delivery, Renee Taylor's jokes explode like hand
grenades, sending the audience into convulsions. Lainie Kazan is so wonderfully entrenched in
her character that even when her lines were a little sketchy, she still had the
audience eating out of the palm of her hand. ("Tonight was a good dress
rehearsal", Ms. Kazan said upon stepping off the stage, ruefully shaking
her head.) Ms. Kazan, please know that the audience didn't care about the lines
because we didn't know them. What mattered was that we knew we were in the hands
of seasoned pros who were going to make us laugh no matter what and you most
certainly did! Joe Bologna was just terrific with his energetic, almost manic
delivery that kept the evening chugging along. Especially hilarious was the
dance sequence between Taylor and Bologna where Fanny ends up in the most
ridiculously contorted positions. Manny Kleinmuntz was very funny as the befuddled
rabbi who thinks the women are having a m_nage a trois. And Anne de Salvo and Rita McKenzie were great as the two daughters
who finally reconcile differences with their difficult mothers.
The
reason we laugh so hard is that we can identify with these delightfully
authentic, ethnic characters. Everyone must have an Aunt like Tess, the one
that wears black all the time and never smiles; and one like Fanny, a sweet,
gullible, unassuming, weepy doormat - even if you're not Jewish or Italian. In
fact in this play's first incarnation in 1996, Tess was originally played by
Beatrice Arthur in LA as an Italian, but when Nanette Fabray took over for the
Off-Broadway debut a year later - Tess was changed to an Irish Catholic.
The
set by
************
CP: Now, I know
you started out as an actress.
When did you discover that you were also a writer?
RT: When I was
in ’ÄúThe Third Ear’Äù with Elaine May. She said that I should start writing things
down. I would do all these
improvisations and Elaine would say, ’ÄúIf you write them down you’Äôll be a writer’Äù. So I would write these jokes down on
these paper bags at rehearsals.
CP: So when did you
discover your voice, as it were?
RT: Well, ’ÄúLovers
and Other Strangers’Äù won an Academy Award nomination so I guess you could say that
it was pretty good.
CP: You’Äôre
unique in that you are accepted as an actress as well as a writer.
RT: I
think that every actress should write her own projects ’Äì create her own
vehicles. I continued to write
because the things that were offered to me weren’Äôt necessarily what I wanted to
do.
CP: So do you
feel a sense of relief, or a sense of accomplishment when you finish a project?
RT: Yes, I
believe that writing is spiritual.
CP: The two
women in Bermuda Avenue Triangle go through quite a metamorphosis from Act One
to Act Two.
RT: All my
plays are about transformation.
Transformation through love --how love heals you -- how love transforms
you. I feel that I was transformed
by the love of my husband.
CP: I think the
audience laughs, not just because the jokes are funny but because we love these
earthy, ethnic characters.
RT: This play
is about my mother and my aunt. We
originally wrote it for Lainie. I’Äôve
known Lainie longer than I’Äôve known my husband. This is the first time that Lainie’Äôs gotten to do it. (Nanette Fabray played the role
Off-Broadway as an Irish Catholic.
Lainie plays her as a Sicilian.)
CP: Do you feel that getting a play into production is
harder than initially creating the piece?
RT: Oh, no,
writing is the hard part. Putting
up the play is easy. That’Äôs the
fun part.