That was the year that was
By MICHAEL SMITH World Entertainment Writer 08/12/01
A NOTE FROM THE NIGHTINGALE:
In it's first year, The Nightingale Theater played host to over 25% of the "Best of Tulsa" for the 2000-2001 season. If you would like to help make theater a self-sustaining activity in Tulsa, contact the Nightingale Theater.
Tyrone Wilkerson played the Ghost of Christmas Present in American Theater Company's production of "A Christmas Carol." KELLY KERR / Tulsa World. Bottom:
A look back at the 2000-01 theater season with a salute to the best
Dramas, comedies, musicals and Shakespeare. Casts ranging in size from one to 70, plays at sites like the Philbrook Museum of Art and Woodward Park -- Tulsa's community theater troupes offered a little bit of everything last season.
There were many high points, several from veterans of the local stage. There was Lisa Wilson and her bald head commanding the stage in American Theater Company's production of "Wit." Almost everything director Ken Spence got involved with became one of the top shows of the year. Tyrone Wilkerson stole the show, as usual, in the annual production of "A Christmas Carol."
Some moments were unforgettable. The destruction of 50 small religious figurines per night in the intense "Lonesome West." The king of rock 'n' roll makes an explosive entrance at a 1904 Paris bistro in "Picasso at the Lapin Agile." The intimidating growl of J.R. Mathews as the delusional big man, Chief Bromden, in Theater Tulsa's "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest." The eeriness of the graveyard scene in "Our Town," in which the residents speak in cold, blunt and sometimes hurtful tones.
But there was perhaps no more satisfying moment than a cold weekend in January, when two shows opened in small spaces with newcomers at the helm.
Craig Walter and Scott Heberling co-founded Theater Club and promised to produce published scripts and "a little more adventurous programming" than Tulsans might usually expect. The troupe delivered with Eve Ensler's "The Vagina Monologues," creating a powerful sisterhood ensemble piece and selling more than 100 overflow tickets a night at the new 54-seat Nightingale Theater.
The success of this show and Heller Theater's concurrent sold-out run of performances of the Steve Martin farce, "Picasso at the Lapin Agile," certainly made a statement about what kind of modern stage works -- and adventurous programming -- Tulsans will line up at the theater for, if it's offered.
We saw more than 35 shows last season (between September 2000 and June 2001) and reviewed them for the Tulsa World. There was a tremendous number of special moments in that time, and these shows and people provided the highlights.
BEST PLAY
"Art"
(Heller Theater, September): One man buys a painting, a totally white canvas. How do his friends like it? Don't ask. The real subject here is friendship, especially among men, and how a seemingly petty event can bring about the downfall of a relationship that's been quietly eroding for some time. Director Heberling's version of Yasmina Reza's Tony Award-winning comedy is full of smart, crackling dialogue, making it an actor's showcase.
"Little Shop of Horrors"
(American Theater Company, October): Acting, directing, writing, singing and scenery all came together brilliantly in this musical comedy, finding just the right voice for this dark and hilarious tale of an innocent and his Faustian pact with a killer Venus flytrap.
"Marvin's Room"
(OK Rep!, October): Scott McPherson's play about mortality, family, responsibilities and failures is quite a remarkable paradox: a comedy about pain. A solid effort by director Jonathan Scott Chinn and several actors made this a moving work.
"Our Town"
(Theater Tulsa, December): Thornton Wilder's classic story of our lives -- "in our growing up and in our marrying and in our doctoring and in our living and in our dying" -- is a vital and fresh work under Spence's direction. Full of wonderfully understated performances, some chilling moments in the graveyard and the year's best sparse set.
"A Christmas Carol"
(American Theater Company, December): God bless us, everyone, for this annual staging of the Dickens' classic, set to music and staged on Richard Ellis' amazing set -- by far the most elaborate among the local community theater companies. Most leave the staging of large musicals to Celebrity Attractions, but "Carol" always lures us back.
"Picasso at the Lapin Agile"
(Heller Theater, January): Steve Martin's fictional farce about a meeting between Pablo Picasso and Albert Einstein in a Paris bar in 1904 is a witty and profound charmer that succeeds on all levels. The dialogue was sharp, the period costuming by April Madden was superb and the set design rendered the Heller stage virtually unrecognizable, with director Devin Meadows turning the black box into a bistro full of color and colorful characters.
(Theatre Club, January) It was 90 minutes of women on stage, sometimes alone, sometimes in groups, recounting directly to the audience the experiences of the more than 200 women Eve Ensler interviewed and used as the basis for this show about women's most private of private parts. There was initially a concern that the controversial subject matter would turn the locals away. Instead, people were turned away from the box office as nine performances became standing-room only events under Sue Webb's direction.
"Driving Miss Daisy"
(American Theater Company, February): A tale of great love, care, understanding and pride -- between a proud Southern lady and a proud black man -- is constructed by Spence, with spellbinding performances but also very strong technical and costuming work.
"Prisoner of Second Avenue"
(Theater Tulsa, March): The work of director Vern Stefanic and standout portrayals by Craig Walter and Thesa Loving make Neil Simon's dark comedy about losing your job and maybe your mind in a hot New York City summer seem just as relevant today as when the play premiered 30 years ago.
"Wit"
(American Theater Company, June): Lisa Wilson gives the standout performance of the year in Margaret Edson's brilliant play, which is smart enough to realize that people aren't just dying of cancer, they are living with cancer.
Angi Triggs portrays Suzanne and Jeff Murrin took the role of Picasso in Heller Theater's production of "Picasso at the Lapin Agile." MICHAEL WYKE / Tulsa World
BEST ACTOR
Derek Adams
"Art"
Mike Pryor
"Little Shop of Horrors"
Craig Walter
"Prisoner of Second Avenue"
Randal Whalen
"American Buffalo"
Tyrone Wilkerson
"Driving Miss Daisy"
Fortunately, our best local actors keep working again and again. Choosing a show for Walter among his jobless "Prisoner," frustrated friend in "Art" and political prisoner in Theater Club's "Largo Desolato" was very difficult, as any could have qualified. Whalen was the calm at the center of David Mamet's stormy crime tale, but he was also remarkable as the Stage Manager in "Our Town," among other fine performances. "Christmas Carol" favorite Wilkerson played his first lead role in seven years and made Miss Daisy's chauffeur come to vivid life. Adams worked with Walter to make great "Art," but he was also a ranting, destructive joy sparring with George Nelson in Theater Club's "Lonesome West." As for Pryor, he was simply brilliant in his only role this year, flawless in his singing, dancing and acting as Seymour, the nerdy caretaker of a plant bent on world destruction.
The village gossips played by (left to right) Jana Ellis, Catherine Skalla, and stand-in Sally Barnes gossip about the drunken choir master in a scene from "Our Town," a Pulitzer Prize-winning play that Theater Tulsa put on. JAMES GIBBARD / Tulsa World
BEST ACTRESS
Jolyn Duncan
"Stop Kiss"
Carolyn Lowery
"Driving Miss Daisy"
Heather Richetto-Rumley
"Little Shop of Horrors"
Annette Rosenheck
"Beast of Burden"
Lisa Wilson
"Wit"
There were at times a woefully small amount of quality parts for women available this past season, but these five women made the most of these plum roles. Richetto-Rumley was a comical and sweet-voiced delight as Audrey, matching Pryor step for step. The same was true of Lowery, who created her Daisy Werthan out of a wonderful give-and-take relationship with Wilkerson. Rosenheck was spellbinding as the manipulative hag of a housekeeper -- who doesn't clean house -- in the beyond-absurdist "Beast of Burden" at Heller Theater. Duncan used her body language, gestures and facial expressions to amazing effect in exhibiting the sexual undertones between two women in Stefanic's "Stop Kiss" for Theater Club. As brilliant as these portrayals were, Wilson gave the performance of the season, showing us the genius of her character and running the gamut of emotions in what often seemed like a one-woman show.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Robert Frayser
"Lonesome West"
Greg Hermann
"Marvin's Room"
Duwayne Mills
"American Buffalo"
Jeff Murrin
"Picasso at the Lapin Agile"
Chad Oliverson
"Little Shop of Horrors"
The toughest category to whittle down to just five nominees, as the more than a dozen considered often made impressive appearances in multiple works during the season. Frayser gets the call for the year's most touching portrayal of a complex character in Father Welsh , a priest who is slowly losing his mind and is eventually driven to drink and worse. Murrin gets the nod here for "Picasso," but he was also superb in "Beast of Burden" and "Stop Kiss" Oliverson didn't need multiple plays to portray multiple characters -- as the insane dentist, a Hollywood mover and shaker, a starstruck customer, a plant company salesman, a woman, etc., he portrayed more than half the characters in "Little Shop" to hilarious effect. Hermann was perfect as your average distracted teenager, showing true disinterest and apathy for life and family, but easily making his character light up when he is shown real kindness. Mills is exceptional as the troubled young drug addict who spends his time slumped in a chair, making excuses and making a mess of a badly planned heist.
Joseph Gomez and Lauren Brown, with Sara Cruncleton lurking in the shadows. KELLY KERR / Tulsa World
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Sara Cruncleton
"Cymbeline"
Jana Ellis
"Our Town"
Maureen Hawley
"Marvin's Room"
Susan Little
"The Vagina Monologues"
Liz Masters
"The Vagina Monologues"
It's not easy to single out one or two women from the year's best ensemble, but there's no way to select all nine of them. Little is beautifully bittersweet as the senior citizen recounting an embarrassing moment from her youth in the section titled, "The Flood." Meanwhile, Masters -- so good in several other plays this year as well -- hilariously stalks the stage in "My Angry Vagina," running down the list of negatives when it comes to tampons, thong underwear and pelvic exams ("What's with the flashlight up there, like it's Nancy Drew? What's with the Nazi stirrups?"). Cruncleton voraciously chewed up the Shakespearean scenery and spat it back out as the wicked stepmother in Midwestern Theater Troupe's epic . Ellis was a quality performer for Theater Tulsa this season and best as the motherly Mrs. Gibbs, in life and in death for this role. Hawley was a gem as the flighty Aunt Ruth, a standout among many strong supporting performers in this show.
Michael Smith, World entertainment writer, can be reached at 581-8474 or via e-mail at michael.smith@tulsaworld.com.