Playwright: Jane Martin
At: Apple Tree Theatre, 1850 Green Bay, Highland Park
Phone: 847-432-4335; $35-$45
Runs through: July 15
BY MARY SHEN BARNIDGE
It would be simple to dismiss the issues discussed in Jane Martin's comedy as irrelevant to audiences in 2007. Don't the female-buddy heroines—a cringing Stepford Wife and a single-mom thief from the projects—introduce themselves with generic backstories long reduced to stereotype? So smug and savvy are we that it never occurs to us that one—or even both—of them might be lying.
The story begins farcically enough: A robber breaks into a rich matron's home one night to discover the rooms stripped of their furniture and the mistress of the house cowering in neurotic withdrawal, surrounded by empty pizza boxes and crumpled soda cans. Ata's estranged husband, it emerges, has recently driven up in a truck and removed everything he ever gave his compliant spouse, still considering this to be his property. Would-be burglar Bo offers to help Ata recover her possessions, but when the latter—with a little encouragement—turns out to have a talent for the old bluff-and-snatch, the confederates set their sights on bigger game.
Caution must be observed in resurrecting plays premised on gender politics. Substantial progress having been achieved in the years since Criminal Hearts premiered in 1994; many draconian measures once viewed as triumphs of the helpless against the oppressive are no longer as automatically justifiable. That said, however, the lobby chat during intermission at the performance I attended, as well as a spontaneous burst of applause during act two, roundly reaffirmed the timeliness of these themes. As much as we want to believe that selfish, paternalistic, controlling men are a breed easily exposed nowadays, there still exist—indigenous to Apple Tree Theatre, anyway—gullible women who fall prey to marital casuistry. And when social acceptance is predicated on economic and emotional manipulation, is it any wonder that its victims take so readily to con-artistry?
Without diminishing the play's screwball elements—Ata tends to freeze under stress, a condition rendering her unable to let go of the gun that becomes her security blanket—director Ray Frewen refuses to spare suburban playgoers the discomfort engendered by Martin's satire, instead instructing his cast to adhere to text rather than coast on actorly mannerisms. This more challenging interpretation sometimes makes Candace Taylor's tough-talking Bo and Jonathan Wagner's dumb-but-hunky male sidekick, Robby, appear unsure of their characters. But Martie Sanders delivers a whirlwind of a performance as the liberated Ata, deftly balanced by Kurt Johns' chilling cameo portrait of blow-dried, Brooks Brothers-suited spousal tyranny.