On family and friends

BAILA LAZARUS EDITOR

Two productions are in town this month and next, offering audiences an enjoyable mix of humor and sobriety. Those who enjoyed Katharine Hepburn and Burt Lancaster in the 1956 film The Rainmaker, will equally be pleased with the latest production of the play on which the movie was based.

Written by Richard Nash, who was born Nathan Nussbaum, The Rainmaker tells the story of the Curries, a turn-of-the-last-century ranching family that’s suffering severe economic problems due to a terrible drought. Enter Starbuck (William Macdonald), a phoney rainmaker who’s wanted by the police. A charismatic drifter who thinks he can make things happen simply by believing that he can, Starbuck ends up seducing Lizzie, the rancher’s daughter who has dolefully accepted what she thinks is her lot in life – that of being a spinster. He fills her with belief in herself and brings hope to the somewhat dysfunctional family.

Although the original play, written in 1954, and the movie that followed maintained a rather serious tone throughout, the current production has a wonderfully light feel to it, with many lines garnering laughs from the audience.

Most of the humor came through the role of the innocent son, Jim Curry, marvelously played by Bob Frazer. Constantly put down by his cynical, overbearing brother, Noah (Ari Cohen), Jim revels in Starbuck’s optimism and imagination. Eventually, the entire family takes to the drifter, prefering to maintain an attitude of hopefulness rather than submit to dismal reality.

Dawn Petten does a fair job as the downhearted Lizzie but her character is weakly played at times. Though it’s true that the character of Lizzie is supposed to be somewhat lost in her understanding of who she is, Petten herself seems to have trouble portraying that confusion consistently.

Rounding out the performances are strong appearances by Tom Butler as H.C. Curry; Christopher Sigurdson as File, Lizzie’s suitor; and David Adams as Sheriff Thomas. The Rainmaker is directed by Bill Dow.

The Rainmaker is on at the Playhouse until April 13. Call 604-280-3311 for tickets.

A taste of friendship

If a more contemporary work is what you’re after, the Stanley Theatre offers a delectible production in Donald Margulies’ Dinner With Friends. A quick-moving, rather chatty play, Dinner focuses on two families whose marriages go through various levels of stress. When Tom and Beth decide to divorce, their friends, Karen and Gabe start to choose sides and examine their own relationship.

Not unexpectedly, Karen sides with Beth, offering her unequivocal support, while Gabe is less concerned with comforting his friend than he is with finding out with whom Tom is having an affair.

“My plays are fairly diverse, but their unifying theme is loss,” Margulies, who also wrote Sight Unseen, says about his work.

“I am a second-generation American Jew. I grew up among immigrant Jews and I think that really has informed my world view. And it certainly has figured prominently in many of my plays, the notion of identity and questions of assimilation and where one fits in the world.”

Dinner With Friends, which won Margulies a Pulitzer in 2000, is a witty, intelligently written play that will have you laughing at the characters at the same time as they remind you about your own relationships.

The casting is excellent with Jackson Davies as Gabe, Camille Mitchell as Karen, Susan Hogan as Beth and Gerry Mackay as Tom. Direction is by Bill Mellerd.

Dinner runs at the Stanley Theatre until April 14. Call 604-280-3311 for tickets.

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