Diversions > Theater
A Perfect Ganesh
West End Players Guild
Monday, November 17, 2008 10:46 AM CST
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Play: A Perfect Ganesh
Group: West End Players Guild
Venue: Union Avenue Christian Church, 733 North Union
Dates: November 21,22,23
Tickets: $15 and $18; contact 314-367-0025 or westendplayers@sbcglobal.net
Story: Margaret and Katherine are a pair of middle-aged women of means who often have vacationed as a foursome with their husbands in the Caribbean and other familiar locales. This year (1993), though, they decide to do something truly different: Make a journey of soul-searching and discovery on their own in the mystical land of India.
Although they’ve been friends for many years, they learn much about each other on the sojourn. Margaret, patrician, pushy and a bit arrogant, is the archetypal Ugly American, while Katherine stares in wide-eyed wonderment at the land and people she encounters. Katherine still yearns to purge herself of the guilt associated with her oldest child’s death, a murderous gay-bashing, while Margaret keeps painful secrets to herself. Their primary passage to salvation arrives in the person of Ganesha, an amiable Indian god who invisibly journeys with them and provides moral assistance.
Highlights: Prolific and immensely talented writer Terrence McNally received his only Pulitzer Prime nomination for this 1993 drama, an impressive note considering his body of work (Love! Valour! Compassion!, Lips Together, Teeth Apart, books for the musicals Ragtime, The Full Monty and Kiss of the Spider Woman). The four-performer work is given a gentle and charming rendering in the current West End Players Guild production directed carefully and craftily by Sean Ruprecht-Belt.
Other Info: Starting with a pristine set of simple white sheets designed by Nik Uhlmansiek, who also designed the austere and effective lighting, the presentation focuses on the feelings and relationship of the two valiant women. The solid technical support also includes Russell Bettlach’s costumes, such as Ganesha’s playful robes and a startlingly blood-stained shirt to adorn Katherine’s son, and the soft rumble of railroad tracks in Robin Weatherall’s complementary sound design.
There’s also a magnificent mask of Ganesha created by Marjorie Williamson that evokes the combination of spirituality and playfulness inherent in the portly Hindu deity who sports an elephant’s head. Late in the play a puppeteer helps Ganesha recount the story of his creation to add to the play’s beguiling charm.
Steve Callahan brings a fine mixture of whimsy and gentility to Ganesha, although his cadence seemed occasionally off-kilter and erratic for whatever reason. He also effectively portrays a number of people encountered by the two ladies on their trip, including a compassionate Japanese couple.
Matt Hanify does very good work in a number of roles, including Katherine’s deceased gay, and favorite, child, as well as some oafish airline employees, a greedy Indian hotel manager and a self-centered American.
And there’s some highly affecting work by Jane Abling and Renee Sevier-Monsey as the gal pals. Abling plays the more refined and repressed Margaret, keeping a steely composure despite a litany of personal tragedies, while Sevier-Monsey is finely attuned to the nuances of Katherine’s more expressive nature.
A fine script and an engaging production make A Perfect Ganesh a surprisingly poignant treat.
Rating: A 4 on a scale of 1-to-5.
Group: West End Players Guild
Venue: Union Avenue Christian Church, 733 North Union
Dates: November 21,22,23
Tickets: $15 and $18; contact 314-367-0025 or westendplayers@sbcglobal.net
Story: Margaret and Katherine are a pair of middle-aged women of means who often have vacationed as a foursome with their husbands in the Caribbean and other familiar locales. This year (1993), though, they decide to do something truly different: Make a journey of soul-searching and discovery on their own in the mystical land of India.
Although they’ve been friends for many years, they learn much about each other on the sojourn. Margaret, patrician, pushy and a bit arrogant, is the archetypal Ugly American, while Katherine stares in wide-eyed wonderment at the land and people she encounters. Katherine still yearns to purge herself of the guilt associated with her oldest child’s death, a murderous gay-bashing, while Margaret keeps painful secrets to herself. Their primary passage to salvation arrives in the person of Ganesha, an amiable Indian god who invisibly journeys with them and provides moral assistance.
Highlights: Prolific and immensely talented writer Terrence McNally received his only Pulitzer Prime nomination for this 1993 drama, an impressive note considering his body of work (Love! Valour! Compassion!, Lips Together, Teeth Apart, books for the musicals Ragtime, The Full Monty and Kiss of the Spider Woman). The four-performer work is given a gentle and charming rendering in the current West End Players Guild production directed carefully and craftily by Sean Ruprecht-Belt.
Other Info: Starting with a pristine set of simple white sheets designed by Nik Uhlmansiek, who also designed the austere and effective lighting, the presentation focuses on the feelings and relationship of the two valiant women. The solid technical support also includes Russell Bettlach’s costumes, such as Ganesha’s playful robes and a startlingly blood-stained shirt to adorn Katherine’s son, and the soft rumble of railroad tracks in Robin Weatherall’s complementary sound design.
There’s also a magnificent mask of Ganesha created by Marjorie Williamson that evokes the combination of spirituality and playfulness inherent in the portly Hindu deity who sports an elephant’s head. Late in the play a puppeteer helps Ganesha recount the story of his creation to add to the play’s beguiling charm.
Steve Callahan brings a fine mixture of whimsy and gentility to Ganesha, although his cadence seemed occasionally off-kilter and erratic for whatever reason. He also effectively portrays a number of people encountered by the two ladies on their trip, including a compassionate Japanese couple.
Matt Hanify does very good work in a number of roles, including Katherine’s deceased gay, and favorite, child, as well as some oafish airline employees, a greedy Indian hotel manager and a self-centered American.
And there’s some highly affecting work by Jane Abling and Renee Sevier-Monsey as the gal pals. Abling plays the more refined and repressed Margaret, keeping a steely composure despite a litany of personal tragedies, while Sevier-Monsey is finely attuned to the nuances of Katherine’s more expressive nature.
A fine script and an engaging production make A Perfect Ganesh a surprisingly poignant treat.
Rating: A 4 on a scale of 1-to-5.
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