June 10-16, 2004

theater

Born Yesterday

by Toby Zinman

Sometimes the oldies really are the goodies. This 1946 comedy by Garson Kanin was a huge hit on stage and then a huge hit in the movies. Judging by audience reaction last week, it is a huge hit again, since this production, directed by Ken Marini, is as sleek and entertaining and, well, OK, call me corny, meaningful as it ever was.

It's the story of Harry Brock, a thuggish multimillionaire who is looking to expand into a world market. He comes to Washington to persuade the senator he's bribed to shepherd through some crooked legislation so he can capitalize on the war bonanza (does Halliburton spring to mind?). With him is Billie, his chorus-girl cutie whose lack of polish makes her a liability in D.C. society. Enter Paul Verrall, a journalist he hires to educate Billie. He succeeds so well that soon she is gobbling up culture and learning that her Sugar Daddy is, as she finally spits out at him, a "fascist." Providing both legal finesse and ironic commentary on the shenanigans is a washed-up lawyer who isn't so drunk he can't see his own complicity.

It's a plot that makes you want to cheer for the little guy, for the power of education, for the strength of democracy. And lines that describe Washington as "a city of few secrets and much chat" reverberate at this moment when a former Senate staffer has just published online her explicit sex diary of trysts with government officials.

The cast is uniformly good (the pleasures of watching a repertory company's members take on a variety of roles of different sizes and shapes). Most surprising was Karen Peakes, whose lean, brunette looks don't suggest the blonde bombshell she plays here, but there she is, all wiggles and giggles. As the noble reporter (now there's a concept), Lenny Haas could do with a bit more Cary Grant, but is otherwise quite charming, and Mark Lazar is an impressive Brock. But most interesting is what Stephen Novelli does with the nearly minor part of the alcoholic lawyer — wearing his impeccable suits and an ashen-faced weariness, creating a character of a subtle self-loathing, and resisting the role's easy temptation to self-pitying caricature.

In an election year, the crooked senator's warning could have been spoken yesterday instead of half a century ago: "This country is going to have to decide if the people are going to run the government or if the government is going to run the people."

BORN YESTERDAY - Through June 20, People's Light & Theatre Co., 39 Conestoga Rd., Malvern, 610-644-3500