Theatre Review—

Spinning Wheel Inn Offers Zippy Summer Entertainment

By June April

REDDING RIDGE — A brand new venture at The Spinning Wheel Wheel Inn has taken the popularity of the inn’s winter/holiday dinner theatres and brought it back out for a mid-summer treat. The Stiletto’s is a combination of many of those wonderful songs from the 60s, like “Itsy Bitsy Teeney Weeny Yellow Polka-Dot Bikini” and “Doo Wah Ditty” that still capture our hearts and bring the smiles only nostalgia can inspire that are live at the charming Spinning Wheel Inn Restaurant for five more performances.

Stiletto’s is another venture combining food and entertainment in Redding’s bucolic setting. Summer Sunday Cabaret has evening shows at 5 pm through August 6 and brunch presentations at 1 pm on August 6 and 13.

The range in ages of the audience this past weekend was at least from 20s to 70s and they were all happy faces, clearly relishing the fare and the “golden oldies.”

The setting is New Year’s Eve in 1965. A four-sister singing act, The Stiletto’s mistakenly arrive in Redding, Conn. rather than Reading, Penn. to perform.

Written and directed by Brad Blake, who also serves as the piano accompanist for The Stiletto’s, his is a familiar force in the musical presentations at The Spinning Wheel Inn. Specializing in parodies and reviews, Mr Blake has created, accompanied and arranged music for the popular Christmas show at the restaurant as well as many other theatres in Connecticut, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

The sister act is four women who truly capture the rather ditzy way of the 60s middle class female. They’re the kind of women blonde jokes abound about, even though the hair color may be in question. That last statement may be politically incorrect, but it does give a fairly accurate sense of their behaviors.

Fiona Crowley, Juliette Garrison, Diana Matson and Priscilla Squires all exude a vibrant energy as the singing sisters, and their intermittent antics with members of the audience add a special touch of fun to the afternoon’s entertainment.

Nostalgia is deliciously blatant, from Pez dispensers and trolls to the wide headbands and shoulder-length flipped-up hair styles. The A-line jockey-like dresses were caricatures of the era, as were many of the behaviors. But it was good fun, and evoked many a nod of one’s past recollections.

(Located on Route 58/Black Rock Turnpike, the Spinning Wheel Inn Restaurant is easy to spot from any direction. A three-course meal is served between the three acts of the musical show. Brunch-performance tickets are $29.50 per person, dinner-performances are $34.50, and neither price includes tax and gratuity. Contact Spinning Wheel Inn at 938-9080.)