Playhouse begins summer season

By TOM KANE

FORESTBURGH, NY — A dumb blond stole the show right from underneath the noses of other players at the Forestburgh Playhouse last week.

“Born Yesterday,” written by Garson Kanin, is the story of Harry Brock, a corrupt, crusty, millionaire junk dealer who is attempting to buy off a U.S. Senator. He is accompanied by his young, shapely, blond paramour, Billie Dawn.

Billie, brilliantly and comically played to the hilt by Trista Moldovan, a New York City actress, is the quintessential dumb blond who says all the wrong things at the wrong times—or maybe all the right things at the right times.

A third character, Paul Verrall, is hired by Harry to be Billie’s tutor and given the charge of rounding out Billie’s rough edges. Paul successfully works on Billie’s edges and then some.

Billie becomes quickly enamored of books, big vocabulary words and finally, of Paul.

This play is an old favorite that has been produced as a film at least twice. In the 1950s, Billie was played by the immortal Judy Holiday, and Harry was played by the versatile Broderick Crawford. In the 1950s production, Paul was played by William Holden.

Just to satisfy your curiosity, the second film production had Melanie Griffin playing Billie, John Goodman playing Harry and Don Johnson playing Paul.

This Forestburgh Playhouse version, of course, was not as memorable as either of the two film versions, with the exception of Moldovan’s portrayal of Billie. Whenever she enters and sashays across the stage, which happily happens frequently, the action centers on her, even though she may say absolutely nothing. It’s all in her gestures, her timing and her seductive movement, which she never stops telegraphing to the audience.

Then, when she opens her beautiful mouth, out comes the harshest, most profane Brooklyn accent you have ever heard, in a high pitch that cuts the airs.

It was hard to stop watching her since, like all fine actors, she constantly stayed in character, even when she was just sitting, filing her nails and rhythmically swinging her foot.

One of the greatest sins an actor can commit is to upstage another actor who is the center of the action at a particular moment. Moldovan knew just when to legitimately upstage and when not to.

Allen Lewis Rickman, as Harry, has had a successful career in Off- Broadway productions and in extensive regional theater throughout the county. His co-written comedy has had productions in Barcelona, Copenhagen and Paris.

Another standout performance was Joel Vig’s portrayal of the corrupted, remorseful, tipster lawyer, Ed Devery, whose virtue and character have been usurped by his dependence on Harry’s generous supply of bribery money. Billy’s emerging understanding of what is lawful and what is unlawful about Harry’s deals shames the drunkard lawyer and jars his conscience with her honest sincerity and her prodding questions.

The corrupt Senator Norval Hedges, played with congressional dignity by Bob Heitman, is another victim of Harry’s use of buy-off money as well as Billie’s innocent prodding about moral truth.

One of the signs that a play has been well directed is that every character ends up exactly where they’re supposed to and never distracts from the action unfolding on stage. This production was remarkably directed by Ron Nash, who has been a production stage manager on Broadway for 12 years. Among his directional credits are productions peopled by such actors as Tammy Grimes, Arlene Dahl and Loretta Swit.

No stranger to the Forestburgh Playhouse, Nash has directed Playhouse productions of “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas,” “A Christmas Carol,” “The Sunshine Boys” and several others.

The playhouse’s run of “Born Yesterday” has concluded, though other productions planned this season, in the order of their appearance, are: “Dial M for Murder,” “Westside Story,” “Seven Brides for Sevens Brothers,” “South Pacific,” “Grease” and “The Full Monty.”

For more information call 845/794-1194 or visit www.fbplayhouse.com.