Say Goodnight, Gracie

Reviewed by Holly Bartges

It is difficult to imagine a play missing a plot can be enchanting, hysterical, commanding, and thoughtful. Unless that play with no plot features highly talented actors, an insightful director, bringing characters alive from the past with dead on accuracy.

Matt Ellison and Alexandria St. Aubin in Theater Company of Lafayette’s Say Goodnight, Gracie.

Ralph Pape’s Broadway hit Say Goodnight, Gracie ran four weekends at Lafayette’s historic Mary Miller theatre. Once more it needs to be said Ð would that Mary Miller productions could and would indulge in longer runs. Gracie was a perfect example as to why.

Directed by Ian Gerber who knows how to climb inside scripts he loves, manages to reach into the throats of actors bringing full-fledged characters to the forefront. Say Goodnight Gracie is all about five incredible characters in 1976 facing a major turning point in their lives. All 28 years old, all facing the reality that the Big 3-0 stares them in the eyeballs, and these five have got to figure out what it is they are going to do with the rest of their lives. Thinking clearly becomes slightly difficult “when smoke gets in your eyes,” especially when that smoke hangs heavy in the air from weed.

It’s high school reunion time for them, and they’re all going; all of them except for one, that is. Well, actually none of them get to go. The weed turns them into catatonic pillars of furniture endowed with sharp tongues and quick wit.

Engrossed in the 1970s, the five long for the television of the 1950’s frequently reminiscing and quoting favorite characters and episodes. It doesn’t help their immediate situation.

Jerry (Stephen Bliley) returns to the apartment he shares with his girlfriend Ginny (Rhonda Belser) in New York’s East Village with his tail dragging. A wannabe actor, Jerry left a devastating audition after being told, “Not to expect to ever, ever play Macbeth.”

Taken back, he finds his longtime friend Steve (Brock Williams) already there. Demanding to know who let him in, Steve tells him Ginny did before she left on an errand.

It is September of 1976. The San Francisco Haight Asbury Flower Children have faded. Scars from the Vietnam War haven’t formed yet. The wounds too slow to heal. A few of the Drop Out-Tune In Communes remain across the country, but are slowly giving up and disappearing. It’s an Election year. The economy stumbles wearing shoes too big for its feet. Riots sparked by race and The War in the 1960’s lingers in memories. No wonder they pine for the sitcoms of the 1950’s with Burns and Allen, Groucho Marx, and Milton Berle where life was simple, and happy inside the glass screen. Everyone loved each other and life rolled smoothly along with one joke lapping at the heels of the last.

Steve tries to tell Jerry he has great news, but Jerry becomes consumed over the fact his friend ate his last can of Turkey Chunky soup. Turkey Chunky soup is his absolute favorite.

Sounds simplistic, but Pape’s insightful writing keeps the dialogue on an intriguing believable level, and the actors keep the characters in a very much alive mode. Steve, a would-be writer, honestly believes he has written a sitcom based on Steve that will make them both rich and famous. With smoke in the eyes, fantasies back then easily became confused with reality.

Bobby (Matt Ellison) and his airline stewardess girlfriend, Catherine (Alexandria St. Aubin) arrives for a pre-party before the reunion. Ellison’s Bobby, with headband, promoted the quintessential laid back Hippy life style. Now they discover Jerry isn’t going wanting Steve to take Ginny so he can quietly lick his bottomed out audition wounds. Bobby brought the weed. And off they go into the wild blue yonder.

Too young to have actually experienced the 70’s “let’s-chill-out- and-see-what-happens-laid=back lifestyle, St. Aubin’s glazed eyes and lost-in-the-woods tantalizing expression remained funny as any of the well-written lines. So realistic, she was magnificent to watch.

While drinking his beer, Bobby asks several times for a can of soda. Of course, he can have a can of soda, but no one moves, and Bobby can’t remember if he got the soda or not.

Catherine ponders about living on the moon, wondering what could be more important. The answer she gets is “Kramden coming home and finding Alice in bed with Ed Norton.”

Jenny babbles. Catherine notices the bathtub in the kitchen. Jerry tells her when its cold he uses the tub as a skating rink for mice.

Each character gets their moment in the spotlight pondering their future, exploring who it is they want to be, what they want to do with their lives, along with their hopes, and fears of the uncertain future. Laid back as he is, it is Bobby who often sharpened the relevance with “Everything cycles. Like the three cycles on a washing machine: birth, life, and death. Everything comes around again so it doesn’t matter. Fifties, sixties, or seventies, it’s all the same.”

For the 90-minue no intermission play, it was one honest laugh after another, and it is a crime the production doesn’t continue.

Sarah Spencer did a grand job of turning the small space into a 1976 New York East Village Apartment. Jackie Tisinai’s costumes were perfect for the actors and the individualized characters. Russell Orr’s lighting design breathed and laughed right along with the clever hilarity of Gracie.

For the moment the marijuana keeps them semi-glued while their consciousness begins to bubble over deep personal issues, their ability to cope, their talents, and lack of, their strengths and weaknesses. In the midst of the hilarity of the lines runs a sobering self esteem issue every age has to find a way to address. It may not be with pot and headbands, but it comes.

Enchanting, funny, thoughtful, the actors provided memorable characters from a significant historical point of view. Gerber’s direction used their chemistry to tie everything neatly together.