Reviews

Check Into "California Suite"

By: Kiley Moore

The Actors Conservatory Theatre invites you to check into "California Suite" at 20 Buckingham Road in Yonkers. Under the fine direction of Janice Faye Hanges, this is one stay you are sure to enjoy!

Guests include couples from New York, Philadelphia, London and Chicago with banter that is classic Neil Simon. The dialogue is updated with a handful of current references that keep this play fun and fresh.

Hannah Warren, played by Sara T. Humphreys, is the beautiful, brassy New Yorker who comes to snatch her teenage daughter back from her ex-husband. Billie Warren is the parent with whom the unseen Jennifer would rather live. Dean Marrazzo plays the ex with a new California lifestyle and the reunion chatter is a pretty good valley, but the Warrens are best when showing their vulnerabilties. By the end of the scene, you can imagine how the t two were once a good couple, Humphreys melts wonderfully into motherhood and still keeps her attitude in tact.

How can you love a guy who just cheated on his wife with a drunk hooker? It's easy with Armand Paganelli as Marvin Michaels, visiting form Philadelphia. Paganelli could have given lessons to Jackie Gleason and John Goodman on comedy. The timing, the movement, the ranting! You'll enjoy a hearty laugh. But how will his wife Millie react? Margaret Uray plays the good woman so well she moves from housewife to hero in minutes. You will find yourself cheering for this pair to make it. Toni Fazzio stepped in for Christy Cuomo on short notice to play the deadweight drunk perfectly.

In scene 3, we peek in at a couple from London. Sara Jarman as the demanding diva, Diana Nichols is superb. Bill Magliano is just as wonderful as her supportive and nearly perfect husband, Sidney. Deliciously crisp, elegant and tense is how they make their way to the Academy Awards. Sloppy, drunk and wobbly is how they return, only to reveal their inner demons Jarman and Magliano make an entertaining and bittersweet couple. Neither gets everything they need from this relationship but both shine in sharing a special intimacy and in loving each other in different ways.

Should friends go on vacation together ? Not this group from Chicago. Beth and Mort Hollender (Melody Gropper and Patrick Mahoney) limp in to "California Suite" from a round of tennis with Stu and Gert Franklyn (Michel Forgang and Margaret Uray). Mort is sure the Franklyn's are responsible for his wife's sore ankle and everything else that's going wrong on their trip. No one escapes without insult and injury as the four go at it. Michel Forgang is a delight as the wiry checkbook toting, leg biter who is ready to settle the score on all fronts. Uray is his well-matched wife whose snooping in the Hollender's bathroom sets the disaster in motion. Mahoney booms large and Gropper winces a plenty as the Franklyn's tap dance gracefully on their last nerve.

"California Suite" looks good enough to live in. The stage, half-bedroom and half-sitting room, is solid, inviting and richly appointed. The lighting is also top notch. An especially nice touch is the marking of time from night to dawn to mid morning which occurs in the second scene. Special touches show the attention to detail - throughout the four vignettes, light from the hall sneaks in and around the doors at night in contrast to the sunlight pouring gin from the veranda by day. The use of a "housekeeper" is a nice bit who changes the set so quickly and efficiently she deserves to be tipped.