A promising youth who could
be a surgeon or concert violinist is a
pedicurist and member of a tango quartet. His
dead mother, whom only he can see and hear, is
determined he live up to his promises. Love and
Laughter, two potent allies, hasten the
inevitable!
Nucky Walder and Peter Pereyra are well on their way to becoming a first class comedy team as confirmed by their second mother/son acting chore...this time in "She Returned One Night" (To5/31) at the Teatro de la Luna at Gunston. This time she is a returned-from-the-grave hispanic Jewish mother who wants to give her approval for her son's soon-to-be wife after she has browbeaten him for years of batchelorhood. It is a romantic farce all the way and director Mario Marcel has filled the stage with fast and effective comedy routines that makes it a riotous evening of entertainment with a most tender ending. Peter Pereyra has exceptional comedy technique especially in his "drunken" scene where he bamboozles his two friends, Alex Alburqueque and Gerald Montoya, with a fake ghost scene and these two actors are wonderful foils. Wonderfully expressive Nucky Walder again presents an expected top rate performance. Gerald Montoya also does a wonderful confused supposed-patient who must go through wild undressing for just a bum toe? Anabel Marcano is the oversexed kitten who can't wait for the wedding ring but quickly burns and turns when she suspects another woman in the picture. Sweet-in-person offstage Marcela Ferlito plays the archangel who is the deus ex machina to correct the bad earth situations with sometimes militaristic aplomb. Alex Lopez-Montanez and Cythia Urrunaga play fine graveyard buddies. Ayun Fedorcha does her usually fine lighting on a well built bachelor apartment set design by Mario Marcel. Again Teatro de la Luna comes through with an exceptionally fine family play that keeps the audience still laughing as they leave the theater. (Reviewed by Bob Anthony)
One reason I love to see plays at Washington D.C.’s Hispanic
theaters is that I emerge renewed, as if I’ve traveled
through a parallel universe. Meet Eduardo Rovner, a multi-prize-winning
Argentine playwright, whose 35 plays have been translated
into many languages and produced internationally. Thanks to
Teatro de la Luna’s artistic director Mario Marcel we can
experience the delicate balance between the real and the
magical world of one of Rovner’s wonderful farces. Marcel’s
passion for drawing out the best in his inspired and gifted
performers has more than succeeded in bringing this comedy
about a mother-son relationship to life. She Returned One
Night is so believable you’ll laugh your heart out and be
filled with wonder.
For
theatergoers fluent in Spanish, here's a bright, fun
and genuinely funny comedy that washes over you in
laughs. For non-Spanish speaking theatergoers,
watching the play in Spanish while reading the
English surtitles is a bit more work. In this case,
however, that work is rewarded handsomely. This is
particularly noteworthy for a comedy as humor can
often be the victim of the concentration on
surtitles and the lack of control the performers
have over the timing of their lines reaching your
funny bone. No such problem this night. The laughs
which resound from those who are sitting in the
first four rows where the surtitles aren't quite as
visible are echoed just as strongly along the rear
two rows marked for those who want a clear view of
the surtitle screen. Sure its predictable. Sure its
formulaic. Sure its silly. But it works because such
a formula for silliness works when done well and
here it is done well.
Storyline: Manuel visits his mother's grave
frequently to report on his life. He can't see her,
but she hangs on his every word. When he says he's
being married the next day, she returns from the
grave to check on her offspring and finds, to her
horror, that he may have been stretching the truth a
bit in his graveside reports of his successes. Her
son is the only one who can see or hear her,
resulting in complications on the eve of his
marriage. Throw in an Archangel (complete with wings)
and you have a diverting comedy.
Eduardo Rovner is an Argentinean playwright who ran
his own theater in Buenos Aires until this play
became enough of a hit to encourage him to take up
playwriting full time. It won the Casas de Américas
award for best Latin American Play in 1991 and went
on to success not just in Argentina but in Uruguay,
Brazil and Paraguay as well as getting solid
productions outside of Latin America (Finland,
Israel and now the United States). Its success is in
part understandable because, while it has some
verbal comedy with apparently witty turns of phrase,
its basic humor is plot driven and the story is
clearly told in a physical way - there are plenty of
opportunities for solid physical actions and big,
bold reactions, while the characters are easily kept
straight as the plot unfolds. This reviewer is not
fluent in Spanish and, thus, can’t attest to the
accuracy or quality of David Bradley’s translation.
However, the text as displayed, is both easily
readable and apparently full – it shows no sign of
being simple encapsulations or short summaries of
longer speeches.
The
script calls for energy and that is precisely what
it gets from Mario Marcel’s staging, at least in the
performances of the two leads: Peter Pereyra as
Manuel and the very funny Nucky Walder as his
confused but determined late mother. Each is very
good on his/her own, and there is a comic chemistry
between them that acts to multiply the fun for their
joint scenes. Anabel Marcano lifts the energy level
a notch higher as Manuel’s intended bride.
The
set consists primarily of a relatively typical
apartment with a bedroom with doors leading to a
bathroom and closet on one side, a living room/dining
room on the other with an area to the side for the
graveyard scenes. It is wide enough to provide the
players with plenty of spacein
each area so that their interaction is clear without
being cramped. The costumes serve their functions
well, especially the white robe and wings of Marcela
Ferlito’s Archangel.
Written by Eduardo Rovner. Translated by David
Bradley. Directed by Mario Marcel. Design: Mario
Marcel (set and sound) Cecile Heatley, Loona ,and
Rosita Becker (costumes) Cecile Heatley, Loona, and
Nucky Walder (properties) Ayun Fedorcha (lights)
Raymond Gniewek (photography). Cast: Alex
Alburqueque, Marcela Ferlito, Alex López-Montañez,
Anabel Marcano, Gerald Montoya, Peter Pereyra,
Cynthia Urrunaga, Nucky Walder.
Argentinean playwright Eduardo Rovner’s “She Returned
One Night,” playing at the Teatro de la Luna, is a
delectable piece of magical realism designed to surprise
and delight.
The play begins with an unkempt young man named Manuel
at the graveside of his dear departed mother, Fanny,
telling her of the recent events in his life. As soon as
he includes the fact of his upcoming wedding, Fanny is
propelled out of the grave and back into her son’s life.
Fanny, who is controlling, judgmental and visible only
to her son, disrupts Manuel’s life in every way
imaginable. She appears to him when his friends are
around and they begin to think he is crazy, as he seems
to be talking to the air when she is nearby. Worst of
all, Fanny, who is Jewish and traditional, disapproves
of Manuel’s girlfriend, who is Catholic and quite
uninhibited.
The running joke gets progressively complex until more
ghosts arrive on the scene to spirit Fanny back to the
grave so Manuel can get on with living. Under Mario
Marcel’s crisp direction, the actors in this production
work as a well-balanced ensemble.
Peter Pereyra is delightful as Manuel, who becomes
embroiled in a massive web of lies and is driven to
distraction trying to keep his mother separated from his
friends. He easily makes credible both sides of his
character – the independent young man and the loving
son.
Nucky Walder is hilarious as Manuel’s fussy mother. Even
at her most impossible, there is something adorable in
Fanny’s frazzled, perpetual motion. Fanny is surrounded
by an amusing circle of departed friends, played with
panache by Alex Lopez-Montanez, Cynthia Urrunaga, Alex
Alburqueque and Macela Ferlito.
Alburqueque and Gerald Montoya are humorous as Manuel’s
confused friends, and Anabel Marcano displays a
marvelous combination of patience and frustration as
Manuel’s girlfriend.
Although Rovner’s script runs just a bit too long to
sustain its single joke, Marcel and his actors have
handled the play deftly and delicately, turning it into
an entertaining, theatrical soufflé.
Teatro de la Luna Scores With Riotous Tale of the Dead
“Laugh-out-loud funny” isn't a phrase that should be
thrown about with abandon on the local theater scene.
But it applies to Teatro de la Luna's season-ending
production of “Volvió una Noche” (“She Returned One
Night”), the local premiere of a work by playwright
Eduardo Rovner of Argentina.
The story line could be universal: a mother (in this
case, a protective Jewish mama from South America)
learns from the grave that her only son, the doctor, is
getting married, and returns to his life in order to
make sure everything goes well.
Of course, everything most assuredly does not go well -
where would the comedy be in that? - in large part
because the son hasn't exactly been truthful when he
makes his frequent visits to her grave to update her on
events.
Mayhem breaks out: Only the son can see and hear his
mother, and those around him begin to question his
sanity as the situation starts to unravel.
The three leads are Teatro veterans: Peter Pereyra as
Manny, the son; Nucky Walder as Fanny, his mother; and
Anabel Marcano as Dolly, his fiancée. I worried whether
these familiar faces (Pereyra and Marcano were cast
together as leads in the troupe's biopic of Frida Kahlo)
would take away some of the freshness of the show, but I
needn't have been concerned.
The script is clever from start to finish, with plenty
of farce and physical comedy - including my favorite
kind, semi-clothed physical comedy! - and, perhaps a
little too obviously, an ending that sends everyone out
of the theater feeling all warm and happy.
Pereyra and Marcano are quite good, but it is Walder who
makes the show her own, with abounding energy and comic
timing.
In fact, everyone in the cast of eight performs well. To
pick out a few supporting performers, Gerald Montoya and
Alex Albuqueque are hoots as Manny's friends, who have
been let in on the little secret of his mother's return,
and Marcela Ferlito has a ball as an angel, sent to help
Fanny make sure everything turns out all right.
(How a Christian archangel ended up helping those in a
Jewish cemetery is part of the entertaining story line.)
An interesting side show is Rovner's depiction of what
goes on at cemeteries when the living aren't looking;
apparently, all the post-mortem pals are having plenty
of fun. Good for them.
Director Mario Marcel's pacing is strong, and his
handling of the physical situations is deft.
One “tsk-tsk”: A recent Saturday matinee started 15
minutes late, in order to accommodate a large number of
stragglers who filtered into the theater on their own
schedule. Why those of us who arrived on time - ahead of
time, actually - should have been penalized for the
latecomers escapes me.
That quibble aside, this was a very solid outing from
the Teatro team, rounding out what has been an
interesting and generally successful season.
The production is in Spanish, with English surtitles
projected above the stage.
Special to The Washington Post
Wednesday, May 14, 2008; Page C08
The machinery of farce churns determinedly but none too
fast in Teatro de la Luna's "Volvió una Noche (She
Returned One Night)." Written by Argentine dramatist
Eduardo Rovner -- and performed in Spanish with English
surtitles -- this occasionally inspired, lightweight
entertainment provoked gales of laughter from audiences
at one opening-weekend performance. Still, as directed
by Mario Marcel, the production lacks the quicksilver
pacing that might allow it to transcend its plug-in-the-variables
comic plotline.
That plotline, somewhat akin to "Blithe Spirit's,"
centers on an amiable young fellow named Manuel (Peter
Pereyra), a pedicurist who has a regular gig as the
violinist for a tango quartet. But in frequent chatty
visits to the grave of his mother, Fanny (Nucky Walder),
he has billed himself as a surgeon who moonlights as a
classical musician. In case that weren't deception
enough, he has given the deceased but still very lively
Fanny -- who raised him in the Jewish tradition -- the
impression that his fiancee, Dolly (Anabel Marcano), is
of the same faith. In fact, she is Catholic.
When a supernatural maneuver allows Fanny to visit
Manuel's bachelor pad, his fibs and her presence lead to
predictably ridiculous situations: concealments in the
bathroom; a ruse involving a damaged toenail; a flap
involving knishes; and so on. It all feels a little
boilerplate -- with the exception of the funny cameos by
an energetic archangel (Marcela Ferlito), who's somehow
involved in the metaphysical kerfuffle. Arriving among
the sociable Jewish dead folks in the cemetery, she
hands out her business cards, and, on learning that
she's not dealing with Christians, as she'd expected,
sighs, "This globalization has me totally confused."
As they have demonstrated in other Teatro de la Luna productions, Pereyra and Marcano are engaging performers
blessed with fine comic timing, and they're able to
infuse zing into certain sequences -- Manuel's double
take when his mother materializes from a closet, for
instance. Brandishing her sword and striking mock heroic
poses, Ferlito is droll as the Archangel Lito, a
sandaled, helmeted figure who looks as if she'd just
stepped out of an ancient Greek phalanx. (The costume
designers are Cecile Heatley, Rosita Becker and a one-namer,
Loona.)
Wearing an old-fogy dress with a high lace collar,
Walder's Fanny putters about Manuel's home with
convincing maternal crotchetiness (Marcel designed the
cluttered bourgeois set, with its menorah stowed away on
a cabinet), but some of her scenes feel a shade more
sluggish than they should. The show's poise and pacing
really falter, and its air of professionalism dips, with
the entrance of the play's other figures, including
Manuel's pals Aníbal (Alex Alburqueque) and Julio
(Gerald Montoya) and Fanny's fellow dead people (including
Cynthia Urrunaga and Alex López-Montañez). These minor
characters have little stage time, but what with their
plodding input and the script's run-of-the-mill farcical
complications, it's a relief when Fanny heads back to
the afterlife.
Volvió una Noche (She Returned One Night) by Eduardo
Rovner. Direction and set and sound design by Mario
Marcel; lighting, Ayun Fedorcha. About 2 hours and 20
minutes. In Spanish with English surtitles.