Pasture Prime Players’ founder Don Konopacki has known Starzyk since the second grade, and what better way to salute that lifelong friendship than brightening the Charlton Arts & Activities Center with an engagingly realized production of “Wedding Secrets.” Starzyk was in attendance at Saturday evening’s performance, which may have raised the anxiety level of the cast, eager to impress the author, but despite the occasional lapse in line readings, he had to be pleased with what he saw and heard.
There are a multitude of secrets abounding in “Wedding Secrets,” revealed with strategic parlance as Starzyk’s cleverly constructed machinations snowball into a flurry of domestic misunderstandings. What can be disclosed without harm is that the young couple, Bill (Steve Caputo) and Susan Devlin (Rose Gage), around whom everyone else in this comedy of family matters revolves, have rushed into matrimony, after a brief, breathless courtship.
It’s a secret they hide from Bill’s parents, Robert (Bobby Hunt) and Betty Devlin (Marie Woodman Daley), and Susan’s parents, Dan (David Vilandre) and Joan Thompson (Laurie Jakoboski). Rather than stun their parents with such out of the blue news, Bill and Susan connive to formally announce their “engagement” at Robert and Betty’s home during a weekend visit.
The cast does a very credible job of walking the fine line between the farcical and the recognizable. Caputo and Gage portray Bill and Susan with believable young couple tension and emotion. One aspect of “Wedding Secrets” that separates it from the pure farce category is the simmering acrimony that Betty feels toward Susan, the mother afraid of losing her son and scheming ways to undermine his marriage. Without giving away any details, Bill and Susan begin to have second thoughts about rushing into things. What’s especially noteworthy about Daley’s take on Betty is that she makes her motives understandable, portraying her with seriocomic insecurity that saves her from being merely the mother-in-law-from hell.
Hunt slips comfortably into the role of Robert with a casual, natural performance defined with paternal benevolence and marital frustration. The same can be said for Vilandre’s sympathetic turn as Dan. The heart-to-heart between Hunt and Vilandre is one of the show’s most empathetic scenes. Jakoboski plays Joan with fine, nervy, motherly protectiveness.
Hart is an outlandish marvel as Uncle Joey, the cellar dweller who immerses himself in so much TV that he becomes the characters he’s watching, including his hilariously spot-on impersonation of Kelsey Grammer’s Frazier. There are a couple of secrets of his own that Uncle Joey is harboring, each connected to the other, one absurdly funny, the other absurdly fortuitous.
Kenny Allard is blushingly endearing as Jake Keller, the Devlins' lawn boy, whose heartstrings are tortured by Mia Caseday’s nicely impetuous take on Susan’s younger sister, Samantha. Rounding out the cast in lively style are Joan’s sister, Aunt Grace (Susan B. Callahan), Hooker #1 (Joni Metras), Hooker #2 (Dawn George), Lynn Boucher’s caterer Millie, and Carol Helander’s Sally, the Devins' maid who can’t help stealing a bottle of liquor when no one is looking. Considering all the chaos she’s surrounded by, who can blame her.
Worth noting too are Konopacki’s plushy living room set, and his soothing musical playlist, including Frank Sinatra’s rendition of “I’ve Got You Under My Skin.” If only Ol’ Blue Eyes could hear Uncle Joey’s cover of that romantic ballad. Maybe he can’t, but you can, and are encouraged to.
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