Playwright: Charles L. Mee
Reverie Theatre Company at Live Bait Theatre, 3914 N. Clark St.
Phone: ( 312 ) 409-6501; $15-$20
Through Dec. 18
The plot of Charles L. Mee's Wintertime sounds like a promising farce: Young guy takes his girlfriend to his parents' remote winter cabin with the intention to propose marriage, only to be disturbed by both parents who unexpectedly arrive with their male lovers. Add to the mix an elderly lesbian couple as neighbors and other surprise visitors to thicken the plot.
But Mee, author of unconventional plays like Big Love and First Love, would be loath to do anything as simple or enjoyable as a door-slamming comedy. Instead, Mee trashes the farce structure and serves up Wintertime as a deconstruction of one ( note the obvious symbolic freestanding door wheeled in just for a series of slamming ) .
Instead of showing broad sex farce caricatures in silly shenanigans, Mee inertly dwells almost entirely on their motivations and views on fidelity with plenty of piped-in opera arias ( perhaps to make it seem more sophisticated ) .
Sure there are some funny character tantrums and great physical humor, but Wintertime is mostly characters who speechify in overly intellectual platitudes about the nature of love, devotion and death. This makes Wintertime a very odd creature that unfortunately doesn't add up to much significance by the end.
Reverie Theatre Company makes a game attempt on Wintertime for its Chicago premiere, one that alternates between plenty of shocked guffaws and tedious stretches of being lectured at. This odd mix makes Wintertime very difficult to pull off successfully, especially because it sets out to distance audiences from its self-indulgent characters.
Reverie can't be faulted for getting freezer burn from Wintertime. Director Chris Pomeroy does all he can with his striving cast who try to get a hold of Mee's frustratingly haphazard comic/serious structure.
Some of the more successful performers include Ashely Bagot who gets the dewy-eyed and insanely hope-filled girlfriend Ariel down pat, while Scott Hamilton Westerman is wonderfully brusque as a weird delivery man.
Deanna Boyd and Matt Yde have fun doing loopy dialects as the uber-sensual Italian mother and her French lover, while Steven Eheart's violent tantrums as the frustrated son at least commands attention. Some cast members could work on their line memorization and stilted reactions to the play's many bizarre revelations.
At least the physical production reflects the odd structure of 'Wintertime.' Set designer Larry Geni's compartmentalized Magritte-like set of snow, blue skies, birch trees and a homey cabin fits snugly in the space, while Darcy Elora Hofer does the necessary job of putting everyone in matching floral print underwear ( seen in one of the play's most bizarre moments when everyone rends their garments to atone at a funeral ) .
So don't go into Wintertime expecting a conventional farce. Although there are plenty of laughs to be had, don't be surprised if you also feel contemptuous of Mee's puffed-up writing style, either.