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Regional Reviews: Chicago Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
Almodóvar's women (and one young man) are mostly anxious because of their involvement with the same man, the caddish actor-announcer Ivan (Larry Adams). Pepa (Cory Goodrich) is the lover Ivan has just abandoned as the story begins. Lucia (Hollis Resnik) is the wife he divorced many years earlier, and she's now suing Ivan with the help of her attorney Paulina (Colette Todd), who is shown to have a connection to Ivan of her own. The young man, if not on the verge of a nervous breakdown nonetheless showing much anxiety, is Carlos (Nathan Gardner), the 22-year-old son of Lucia and Ivan, who is having difficulty breaking away from Mama Lucia to move into an apartment with his fiancée Marisa (Dina DiCostanza). Another woman on the verge is Pepa's friend Candela (Summer Naomi Smart), a lusty model who has just become sexually involved with a man who she learns may be a terrorist. The plotlines and characters all come together in unexpected ways, and this sort of multi-plot story is harder to do on stage than on screen. In movies, scenes filmed on multiple locations can be edited together seamlessly, whereas on stage it cab require a laborious and time-consuming process of rolling set pieces around. Though Ann N. Davis's unit set with its decorative wrought iron balcony railings is suggestive of an upscale Madrid neighborhood, the use of backdrops or roll-on flats might have helped to establish the different settings of the action. Regardless of a feeling that Women on the Verge is a work-in-progress whose progress was interrupted, it's still a funny and refreshing piece. It is romantic and farcical, almost like a 20th century female-centric A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum . It's given its due in this production. Just as the short-lived Broadway production had a dream cast of Patti LuPone, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Sherie Rene Scott and Laura Benanti, director Bill Pullinsi's cast has a collection of Chicago's top Equity leading ladies (and one of its go-to leading men). Hollis Resnik fearlessly plays the crazy ex-wife, and Cory Goodrich shows strength along with grief and anxiety as the spurned Pepa. Summer Naomi Smart—whom Chicagoans have seen as a variety of "good girls" ranging from Shrek's Fiona to Mary Poppins and even Elly May Clampett for heaven's sake—gets to sexually slink and shimmy around as the morally loose Candela. And Larry Adams—whom I've always admired more for his bass-baritone than his acting ability—is an absolute scream as the egotistical Ivan. It's a very funny performance and Adams' singing voice is in a fine shape as ever. Nathan Gardner has both the voice and comic skills for Ivan's confused son and, in a smaller role, Colette Todd plays a minor villainess with élan. Choreographer Danny Herman has created some sparkling Latin moves for the able-bodied cast, who look especially great in an '80s Euro sort of way in Brenda Winstead's pastel-colored costumes. The taxi driver, who serves as narrator of sorts, is played by George Andrew Wolff, who stepped in to the role on short notice when actor Bernie Yvon, originally cast in that part, was killed in an automobile accident on his way to rehearsal just five days before the first scheduled performance. Wolff does a fine job under what must be trying circumstances. Women on the Verge is getting a second chance to correct its shortcomings, with a London production directed by the show's Broadway director Bartlett Sher, set to open in January. Whatever problems this piece may have are imminently fixable and I, for one, will be awaiting dispatches on the new production with interest. Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown will play Theatre at the Center, 1040 Ridge Road, Munster, Indiana, through October 12, 2014. For tickets and other information, call the Box Office at 219.836.3255, Tickets.com at 800.511.1552 or visit TheatreAtTheCenter.com.
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