Stones In His Pockets

Reviewed by Holly Bartges

“Cows are important,” the small bright-eyed boy, reports to his class, “They give us milk, eggs, and cheese.” His teacher corrects him about the eggs. Undaunted, he announces one day he would have the best herd of cows in the county.

Seth Maisel and Austin Terrell in the Denver Victorian’s Stones In His Pockets.

Poignantly funny, funnily poignant Marie Jones’ play Stones In His Pockets opened at the Denver Victorian Playhouse a week ago under the inventive direction of Wade P. Wood.

The strategically designed bare stage envisioned by Wood hosts 15 characters. An American Film company invades a small Irish village in County Kerry with prima donna actors and a demanding puffed- up director to film The Quiet Valley. The multi-million dollar project hired locals as extras for 40 quid a day. It’s a busy stage with incredible well-defined characters sporting the various Irish dialects from all over Ireland. Busy as it is, with the 15 characters, two amazing versatile actors, Seth Maisel and Austin Terrell play all of them.

With a twist of a cap, removal of a jacket, in split second timing Maisel and Terrell adapt to each character without even a fragment of doubt as to who is who. Their instantaneous transformation boggles the mind.

Charley (Maisel) and Jake (Terrell) meet on the set punching up their new found relationship with several deserved laughs observing the antics of the American film company eager to make their filming deadline, anxious to keep to the budget, never bothering to learn from the locals, bullying their way with overbearing egos. Unaware, the film company is that little Irish boys coat their dreams of wanting to become American film stars.

Jake just returned to County Kerry after a few unproductive years in the US. Charley’s video shop in Ballycastle has gone bankrupt. Initially, they see the film on their home turf as a temporary relief from a worried economic future.

The cows are important. Sean, (Terrill) loses the tint in his rose colored glasses forgetting his little boy promise. Hollywood starlight blinds his sense of reality, but his courtship with drugs keeps him in trouble as an extra. Disillusioned over Hollywood dreams. The cows were the last things he saw, and the cows watched him disappear. The end of Act I reveals the significance of the title. Dowsing the hilarity into quivering tragedy. The film company has a budget to maintain, a schedule to keep, and yes, they are verbally sorry over the tragedy, but time is money.

Terrell’s transformation from the disillusioned, heartbroken Sean to the little bright-eyed boy leaves the head shaking in wonderment. Hunched depressed shoulders and dulled eyes turn into little boy animation and big, bright sparkling eyes. Somehow, through Terrell’s own brand of magic two characters in juxtaposition are one and the same.

With a twirl and a flip and a twist Charley disappears into Caroline Giovanni, the pampered prima donna, star of The Quiet Valley. The Valley may be quiet, but not Caroline who gets what she wants and wants what she gets. Maisel nearly stops the breath as he moves from Charley to Caroline to the hardcore director, Simon, to the uptight withdrawn Finn worried about Sean.

Terrell’s portrayal of Ansling, the director’s right hand man, or woman, as the case may be, with an organized mind and batting flirtatious eyes is simply awesome.

Susan Lyles’ costume design is a brilliant piece of work. The costumes remain basic for Charley and Jake. Maisel and Terrell can’t rely on costumes to identify their characters. Character identification has to come from inside through body language, expressions, and eyes. They produce way beyond anyone’s expectations.

Karalyn Star Pytel’s lighting design tells its own story parenthetically wrapping the characters in comedic lines and tragic consequences. El Armstrong’s sound design punctuates the plays developments.

Billed as a comedy does a disservice to Stones. There are indeed several hilarious moments as Maisel and Terrell bounce amongst the various characters representing several different points of view, but there are also several moments highlighted by tragedy with the two cultures clashing because of the insensitivity of a large Hollywood film company pushing their agenda while ignoring the very culture they wish to emulate.

Maisel’s concentration on Caroline’s driven sex object attempting to master the Irish brogue is not only “screamingly” funny, it’s coated with ego driven insensitivity. Terrell’s movement from Jake to the depressed Sean, to the barking eye batting Ansling, to the hunched over pipe smoking old man, Mickey, bounces the emotions for giggles to heart wrenching.

Shades of The Ugly American coat the underlining of the American Dream exploding in the face of the economic depressed Ireland’s County Kerry.

Stones bowed to an audience in 1999 in Belfast, becoming a smash hit in London in 2000, and in 2001 it garnered three Tony Awards for its Broadway production. This is one play that demands a keen-eyed director, which the Vic’s production certainly has, and two incredibly talented versatile actors, which Maisel and Terrell definitely are. Without those three main ingredients Stones could easily become a confusing disaster.

To witness the expressions of Charley and Jake when asked to participate in Irish step dancing turns the stomach upside down with laughter as they clumsily attempt to obey. Only a few bars into the music, the amusement turns to eye-popping amazement. Maisel and Terrell give the audience an explosion of Irish step dancing while maintaining Charley and Jake’s persona.

Wedding hilarity with tragedy in split second timing is a brilliant move on the side of the playwright. While the heart laughs out loud, the mind is pricked to think.

To miss this production is simply wrong because of Maisel and Terrell’s awesome execution of 15 characters, Wood’s definitive direction, and the perceptive story Stones In His Pockets wants to tell.