MORE FINE GIRLS by Jennifer Brewin, Leah Cherniak, Ann-Marie MacDonald, Alisa Palmer and Martha Ross (Theatre Columbus/Tarragon, 30 Bridgman). To April 3. See listing. Rating: NN
A last-minute cast change postponed the opening of More Fine Girls, but even that can’t explain its utter failure. The collaboratively written script feels less like a play than notes for a first draft.
A sequel to the 1997 hit The Attic, The Pearls, And Three Fine Girls, the story picks up a decade and a half later, when the three Fine sisters have reunited for the first time in years. Jojo (Martha Ross) is a tenured lit prof who’s avoiding work and her boyfriend Jayne (Ann-Marie MacDonald) is a lesbian lawyer who’s left her practice to become a hobby farmer and Jelly (Severn Thompson, replacing co-writer Leah Cherniak) is an installation artist with a daughter who’s about to turn 13.
Convening first at a restaurant where they crack unfunny jokes about food trends, then at their old family home, where Jelly nursed their father before he died, the siblings bicker, reminisce and avoid discussing matters you just know are going to be revealed at the end.
Things are complicated by the fact that Jelly’s mounting a show in their former dwelling, so the furniture hangs from the ceiling: something the creators obviously invest with symbolic significance.
Much of this would be bearable if the plot weren’t saddled with sitcom contrivances and the actors didn’t resort to the sort of shameless mugging that gives clown a bad name. The script, directed by co-creator Alisa Palmer, offers few insights about work, relationships or even aging. And unlike, say, Crimes Of The Heart, it’s devoid of genuine emotion.
Jelly’s installation, explanations of which Thompson gamely delivers throughout the show, seems full of metaphysical flimflam. Only a short tableau near the end, when the sisters are huddled together on Judith Bowden’s plain but serviceable set, features the kind of writing and acting worthy of these talented artists.
