THE WILD PARTY by Michael John LaChiusa and George C. Wolfe (Acting Up Stage/Obsidian). At Berkeley Street Theatre (26 Berkeley). Runs to March 8, Wednesday-Thursday and Saturday 8 pm, Friday 7 pm, matinees Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday 1 pm. $18-$55. 416-368-3110, canadianstage.com. Rating: NNNN
The Wild Party is fuelled by sex, drugs and 1920s dance craze the Black Bottom.
Throw in some bathtub gin and you get an often raucous, occasionally tender evening of theatre.
The large, ambitious but not fully successful production, a mostly sung show written by Michael John LaChiusa and George C. Wolfe, focuses on the volatile relationship between Queenie (Cara Ricketts) and Burrs (Daren A. Herbert). Shes a blond vaudeville performer attracted to brutal men, hes a minstrel comic with a violent past. One morning, to placate Queenie she has a knife at his throat Burrs suggests throwing a big bash for their friends.
The party and its guests a diverse assortment of people, black and white, whose sexual appetites go in many directions fill the rest of the evening. Too bad theres no intermission the first hour is so filled with actions and intentions that its hard to react to everything and feel something for the characters. Happily, the pace quiets down in the second half.
Director Robert McQueen, with the help of a smoking-hot orchestra led by Bob Foster, juggles the various story lines well, with Ricketts and Herbert shining as a sexy couple whose lives are linked by a short, easily ignited explosive fuse.
In addition to stellar work by the pair, there are also a number of other terrific performers. Dan Chameroy offers warm sensuality as Black, brought to the party by Queenies friend Kate (Sara-Jeanne Hosie) the mutual interest between Queenie and Black leads first to the plays few gentle moments and then to tragedy.
Susan Gilmours Dolores, a determined, spotlight-grabbing diva of the Norma Desmond variety, brings a bitchy tang to her work, while Lisa Horners Madelaine, a lesbian stripper with a new girlfriend (Eden Richmond), provides a comic sense of her own healthy ego even when shes praising her drugged-up partner. As a black boxer with a white wife (Rebecca Auerbach), Sterling Jarvis offers an insight into the racial tension that underpins this society.
Theres also memorable work by two couples, the incestuous DArmano brothers (J. Cameron Barnett and David Lopez) and two Jewish producers (Josh Epstein and Larry Mannell) the latter pair argue about shedding their roots in order to move up in the theatre hierarchy.
Too bad not all the performances are equally strong sometimes the pairing of characters, all of whom should be powerful, feels mismatched in terms of their energy and authority.
Michael Gianfrancescos set, sprawling across the wide Berkeley Street stage, brings together the worlds of vaudeville and Burrs and Queenies apartment its lit with intentionally vivid colours by Kimberly Purtell. Stephanie Grahams choreography captures the period flavour, as do Alex Aminis costumes.
This Wild Party features some first-class talent, but its ultimately not as engaging and emotionally involving as it might be, a problem with the production as well as the script.
But worth seeing? Absolutely.
