Theater Review—

Weighty Summer Fare Worth Digging Into At The Little Theatre

By Julie Stern

In the past decade it has become something of a tradition for Ruth Anne Baumgartner to use her summer vacation from Fairfield University to mount a July production of Elizabethan comedy at Newtown’s Little Theater. This year, a growing number of competing Shakespearean offerings combined with a decrease in the number of experienced supporting performers able or interested in doing Shakespeare led to the cancellation of the scheduled staging of The Taming of the Shrew.

Instead, Ms Baumgartner drew on her interest in modern Irish drama to replace it with Sean O’Casey’s classic work, Juno and the Paycock, and oh, how fortunate we are.

For those not familiar with the play, Paycock is simply the word “peacock” pronounced with an Irish brogue, referring to the boastful, strutting, irresponsible drunkard, “Captain” Jack Boyle, whose bogus claim to the title of sea captain stems from a voyage he once made as a laborer from Dublin to Liverpool.

The time is 1922, not long after The Easter Rebellion, Bloody Sunday, the atrocities committed by the mercenary “Black and Tans,” and the assassination of Michael Collins, in the developing Irish Civil War between the “Free Staters” – who had accepted a negotiated truce with England – and the “Die-hards,” or Republicans, who were committed to winning total independence.

Gritty, long-suffering Juno Boyle lives in a shabby two-room walk-up in a Dublin slum, together with her unemployed husband, their daughter Mary, who is on strike at a local factory, and their son Johnny, a Die-Hard, who was badly crippled in a skirmish with the British.

While Juno struggles to support them, Jack spends his time hanging out with Joxer Daly, a parasitical reprobate who encourages Jack’s pontifications in order to cadge free meals and drink. Johnny, who has lost an arm as well as having a lamed hip, spends his time sulking in the back room, and cringing when he hears a knock on the door. Mary is being courted by the stalwart Jerry Devine, who wants to marry her when he is chosen as shop steward, but she keeps him at arm’s length, because she has higher aspirations.

Things appear to pick up suddenly with the appearance of  Charles Bentham, a law clerk who brings news that Jack’s cousin has died and left him a substantial legacy. On the strength of the promised money to come, the Boyles go on a spree, buying on credit the new furniture and clothes that reflect their new middle class status.

Mary is swept off her feet by the smooth-talking Bentham, and quickly becomes engaged to him. The Boyle apartment becomes the social center of  the building, as the family goes from being an object of pity to a place where neighbors can gather for drink, song and general merriment, while the newly conservative “Captain” dispenses kindly political bromides to his “inferiors.”

But Ireland is a tragic country with a long tradition of suffering and dashed hopes.

By the third act it becomes clear that the promise of good times has evaporated, and everything bad that can happen, will happen.

Director Baumgartner’s talents really shine here. More than a matter of coordinating authentic accents, she has taken a cast of skilled players and guided them to an outstanding performance, controlling every nuance of movement and body language.

Rob Pawlikowski is superb as the insufferable “Captain” while Marguerite Foster is a perfect match as his implacable wife. (Had the production of Shrew been fully cast, these two would have played Petrucchio and Kate.)

Keegan Finlayson is properly smarmy and supercilious as the superior law clerk, while Regan Flynn is both wistful and spirited as the daughter who wants something more than a working class repetition of her parents’ world.

Aaron Szlinsky makes a promising Town Players debut as the tormented Johnny, and Linda Panovich-Sachs does a wonderful turn as Mrs Maisie Madigan, the upstairs neighbor and fair-weather friend.

On the opening weekend, the role of the wheedling, conniving Joxer was played brilliantly by Al Kulcsar, who is apparently alternating with Doug Miller, whose name is listed in the program.

Playing until July 29, Juno and the Paycock is enthralling, entertaining and yet serious drama, unusual fare for the summer but absolutely worth going to. Don’t miss this production.

(Performances are Friday and Saturday evenings, plus a Sunday afternoon matinee on July 23, until July 29;

Contact Town Players of Newtown at 270-9144.)