I kept thinking of Walter, one of the regulars at (late, lamented) Bucks Saloon, when watching The Gift Theatre's current production of The Rise and Fall of Little Voice.
When I was in my twenties, Bucks was my found family's bar of choice. Walter, a common presence there, was forever loading up the jukebox with his favorite Connie Francis tracks and, passionately, singing along with them as their familiar choruses drifted over the crowds. That kind of fervent connection to the divas that inspire us is on full display in this fun and scrappy offering.
Living in seclusion with Mari, her blousy often drunken mother, the timid L.V. spends her days playing the records that her father passed onto her. The songs of Judy Garland, Shirley Bassey and Billie Holiday make up the sum of her emotional inner life, but the appearance of an equally shy telephone repairman begins to shine an outside light into her dreamy solitude.
That tender relationship is soon threatened by the presence of the industrious Ray Say, her mother's new beau. Ray spots a cash cow in L.V., who can perfectly mimic the songstresses that she is obsessed with. The nightclub appearances that Ray forces upon her soon brings about fiery changes, though, that could signal both the end of L.V.'s former existence and the beginning of something tremulously hopeful and new.
With his two main characters practically stepping out of Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie, playwright Jim Cartwright also finds the humor and occasional joy in the British working class environment he portrays here. Scenic Designer Hannah Clark, using the roughhewn open space of the Filament Theatre expertly, gives the environment an appropriately impoverished subtext. Cartwright would be proud.
The cast, guided by directing duo Devon de Mayo and Peter G. Anderson, fill in the occasionally stereotypical nature of their roles with precision, as well. Of them all, Ben Veatch makes his Ray the most humanly believable while Alexandra Main supplies moments of giddy understanding for her frequently boorish yet oddly lovable Mari. Emjoy Gavino, who potently channels Holiday and the others as L.V., meanwhile emphasizes how much our favorite performers can give outsiders everywhere a glorious way to speak.
The Rise and Fall of Little Voice is presented by The Gift Theatre at Filament Theatre, 4041 N. Milwaukee Ave., through Oct. 15. For information, see thegifttheatre.org .