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from the Daily Gazette
By Matthew G. Moross

Production about imaginary bunny a really good show
review of "Harvey"

The Energizer Bunny, Roger Rabbit, Peter Rabbit, Bugs, Thumper, Frank from Donnie Darko - bunnies do seem to be omnipresent, especially this time of year. They’re cute, they’re furry and everybody likes them. The beloved bunny has burrowed itself into our affections and established itself as an icon of popular culture. While the Cadbury Bunny may just be headed off for a long vacation, another bunny is just returning from a little rest, that mischievous rabbit in the fedora, Harvey.

Created and brought to life by playwright Mary Chase, the antics of a man and his drinking buddy bunny were captured in her classic play "Harvey," have been amusing and entertaining audiences for more than 60 years and continue to do so in its present production at Curtain Call Theatre in Latham.

This popular, well-worn comic fantasy is the story of the winsome Elwood P. Dowd and his invisible friend, Harvey, a 6-foot-31⁄2-inch-tall rabbit. When Elwood starts to introduce his fluffy friend Harvey to guests at a party, his social-climbing sister, Veta, and his amative little niece, Myrtle Mae, decide to have him committed to Chumley’s Rest, a local sanitarium, to hopefully spare their family from future embarrassment. Problems arise, however, when a young attending physician mistakenly commits Veta. After myriad comic moments, the truth comes out and a final decision is made on where Elwood’s home should be and who gets custody of the bunny.

"Harvey" was the surprise hit of the 1944 Broadway season, running five years, winning the Pulitzer Prize and returning comic actor Frank Fay to the front rank of stage stars. Incidentally, Fay wasn’t the first choice to star in the play, nor was a 6-foot rabbit the title character in Mary Chase’s first draft. Broadway legend states that the piece was originally penned for Tallulah Bankhead, with her best friend and drinking companion as an invisible 4-foot-tall canary. Whether this bit of trivia is based on one of Bankhead’s well-documented public debaucheries or just another bit of Great White Way fantasy, theater audiences should be thankful for rewrites.

While this production has a winning cast and a first-rate design team, there are a few missteps that mar an otherwise pleasant production. "Harvey" is a deceptively simple play. Usually tossed off as an easy-to-produce slight little bit of comic fluff, just behind the laughter is a poised social commentary. The message is not to be preached out like a sermon, but it is there and should be acknowledged. Unfortunately, director Cindy Brizzell-Bates has made rather torpid and unattentive choices in her approach to the play, allowing the talented cast to flounder at times and search for attention and the laughs.

Few stage characters are as well loved and cherished as Elwood P. Dowd, and Curtain Call veteran Kevin McNamara creates an engaging, amiable man who just wants to be everybody’s friend. As usual, McNamara manages to mine the comedy from every moment and charm the pants off the audience and sanitarium staff doctors alike. The quibble is that Elwood should seem somewhat normal and slightly off–center, and McNamara has been allowed to go a little bit too far. There are a few times too many where choices made place the character on the far side of crazy, allowing the audience to believe that the sanitarium is the best place for him and Harvey.

Managing all of the baggage of Veta’s social-climbing motivations (and the most challenging role in the play), the ever-steady Paula Ginder’s Veta doesn’t seem exasperated enough by her brother’s actions, but Sara Paupini-Fitiizzi’s Myrtle Mae seems overly so, creating an odd and incorrect balance between who should be doing the commitment of Elwood and bunny. Sanitarium staff Kevin Gardner, Ellen Meehan, Ian LaChance and Gary Maggio work well together, but each seems to have flashes of character realizations that they forget to impart and when remembered they rush to get them out for the audience to enjoy.

But the boo-boos here belong to Brizzell-Bates, who allows her cast to seem tentative about the delivery and the style they should be using and never firmly roots the play to its proper period. While hardly fatal to the enjoyment of the evening, these oversights do obscure and partially bury the message behind the laughter.

While there are a few faux paws with style and delivery, there are few if any with the technical aspects of the production. Despite a couple of glitches on the opening night — perhaps the prank of one of Harvey’s friends — the setting designed by Jason Sims is well done and appropriate, moving the action between Elwood’s home and the office at Chumley’s Rest with ease.

Lighting by Greg Goff finishes Sims’ set well, adding subtle touches that never overwhelm or overstate. Anna Lacivita’s costumes are well designed and executed with all of the style and flourish of the period, with attention to detail that is both germane and relevant.

Copyright © 2010 Daily Gazette
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