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Tuesday, 06 June 2006 13:29 |
| Meg Hale
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I love the Stoneleaf Theatre Festival!
For those of you who have been living under a rock since before the first annual festival last year, it is a week-long series of performances by theatre companies from across the state in all of the many live theaters of Asheville. Naturally, there are also shows produced by local theatre companies as well.
I love Stoneleaf because, not only do I get to see tons of theatre in my own backyard, but I also get to see shows by companies that I saw last year.
For
instance, last year I wrote one of my most scathing reviews of the play
?®Killer Joe?∆ performed by the Raleigh Ensemble Players.
This year, I saw the same company doing the show ?®Beautiful Thing?∆ at the Carol Belk Theatre on the campus of UNC Asheville.
?®Beautiful
Thing,?∆ written by Jonathan Harvey, is the story of three kids and one
of the kids?? mothers who all live on one floor of a low-rise apartment
building in London. The doors to their flats are connected by a
balcony, on which the better part of the play takes place. Each of the
kids has his own set of problems.
 Jamie,
played by Jesse R. Gephart, is a fifteen-year-old who is having trouble
in school and having difficulties dealing with his mother??s plentiful
dating life. Ste, played by Ryan Brock, is being abused by his father
on a regular basis.
Leah,
played by Chaunesti Lyon, has been kicked out of school, has parents
that are never home and has a bizarre obsession with the music of Mama
Cass.
Naturally,
it only adds insult to injury when Jamie and Ste realize they have
feelings for each other that neither of their parents will be pleased
by.
I must
say, I thought this show was great ?± especially when compared to the
troupe??s show from last year. The only actor that was in both this and
last year??s shows was Brock, who gave (as I recall) the only
performance I found worthwhile in the previous one. He was likewise
good in this one.
Actually,
all of the acting was pretty good in ?®Beautiful Thing,?∆ especially
considering that all of the characters had thick cockney accents. They
were hard to understand at points, but that is one way to tell if
someone is doing a convincing south London accent.
This
company always has the most amazing sets! For last year??s show, they
had a gutted trailer onstage that the whole play took place in.
For this
one, the entire balcony of the building was constructed. Both were
designed by Miyuki Su, who won an honorable mention for design at the
2005 Theatre Awards by The Independent. What??s especially impressive is
that for each performance of the show during Stoneleaf, the set had to
be put up directly before and taken apart directly after. This has to
be a seriously dedicated set-crew.
I also
loved the music in the show. All of the segues between the scenes were
designated by songs from Mama Cass and a few comical notes from the
soundtrack of ?®The Sound of Music.?∆
In one of
the scenes, Jamie??s mother Sandra, played by Maggie Rasnick, is
watching the Rogers and Hammerstein film. So, during the first romantic
moment between Jamie and Ste, ?®Sixteen going on Seventeen?∆ comes
blasting through the wall.
This show
is very sweet and entertaining. I was much impressed with the work of
the Raleigh Ensemble Players to the level that I am attributing some of
my critiques of their performance of ?®Killer Joe?∆ to the writing. I do
think that ?®Beautiful Thing?∆ is a much better script than ?®Killer Joe.?∆
For me,
the show was a great way to kick off the Stoneleaf Theatre Festival. If
this is any sign about the quality of the rest of the plays, I cannot
wait to catch a few more. I give this show four out of my six planets.
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