|
Deanna Dunagan, seated, as Trudi Stein and Anne Fogarty as Esther Bayer in The Glamour House by Lydia Stryk at Victory Gardens Theater. Photo: Liz Lauren.
|
The Glamour House
by Lydia Stryk
directed by Sandy Shinner
November 9, 2001 - December 23, 2001
Victory Gardens Theater
2257 North Lincoln Avenue
Chicago, IL 60614 USA
Box Office: 773.871.3000
http://www.victorygardens.org
A premise of 'The Glamour House,' the elegant dress shop that is the setting of Lydia Stryk's new play, is that "glamour is illusion and power." Glamour creates an illusion of perfection. Ironically, Victory Gardens's world premiere production of The Glamour House has the same effect. Director Sandy Shinner and the design team of Judith Lundberg (costumes), Tim Morrison (sets), Rita Pietraszek (lights), and Andre Pluess (sound) have mounted a 'glamorous' production. The staged play looks perfect. But the belief that Stryk's play has a deep or powerful message or that the plot with its five characters is more than entertaining vignettes of shop life is illusory.
This minimalist two-act play floats many ideas, but finally develops none of them. The play is set in the 1947 post-World War II immigrant community of Manhattan's upper east side. In Act I, Esther Bayer, who is newly arrived from Germany, becomes a salesgirl in 'The Glamour House,' a dress shop owned by Trudi Stein, who exudes the glamorous perfection of one of the shop's mannequins. In the first scene, Mrs. Stein conducts a master class for Esther in how to sell dresses. Esther proceeds to demonstrate that she has mastered these sales techniques, and sells an expensive party dress to a rotund woman, Mrs. Pauschel. As the act proceeds, Esther become a sales woman extraordinaire by helping the not-so-perfect customers see their beauty. Her kindness and warmth are contrasted to Mrs. Stein's aloof iciness. The shop's business thrives. Mrs. Stein remarks that the inventory is always low because Esther sells so many dresses. Mr. Puccini, a shy young pizzeria manager, who is smitten with Esther, purchases dresses and stockings from her "for his mother." Mrs. Pauschel, the baker's wife, becomes a loyal costumer and brings a big box of sweets that she and Esther hungrily consume in a sweets orgy. Even Mrs. Stein allows herself one of the pastries. However, Esther is not able to pierce Mrs. Stein's reserve. The owner believes that silence is the appropriate sound at 'The Glamour House.' The act ends when Esther, who is alone in the closed shop, slips into a beaded green dress, which she has refused to sell to Mrs. Pauschel, and sings a German song.
The Glamour House presents some archetypal characters and conflicts: artifice versus genuine warmth, old versus new ways of succeeding, outer appearance versus inner beauty. The first part of the play has elements of suspense: who is Esther, who is Mrs. Stein, why does she run a dress shop in this immigrant neighborhood? Stryk resolves most of the issues and mysteries in a very facile and nondramatic narrative. Who is Esther? In a bit of girl talk with the seamstress Rosa, Esther explains how she left Berlin and her life as a singer. Why is Mrs. Stein so aloof? She explains the betrayal and unhappiness of her marriage. Will Esther move on? Without any clue as to her motivation, Mrs. Pauschel wants to become a businesswoman and offers Esther a job managing her new dress shop, The Temple of Beauty.
The five actors perform their essentially one-dimensional roles nobly. Deanna Dunagan is the cool, elegant dress shop owner with a past; Anne Fogarty is the sweet and hopeful immigrant singer; Carmen Roman is the wisecracking, all-knowing seamstress; Cindy Gold, Mrs. Pauschel of the ample proportions, is the baker's wife-cum-entrepreneur; and Marc Jablon is the smitten pizzeria manager who declares his love for Esther. The actors are assisted in defining their characters, not by the playscript, but with the aid of the authentic costumes of Judith Lundberg (although the wigs are distracting), the 1940's music of crooners and swing bands of Andre Pluess's sound design, and Tim Morrison's fully functioning dress shop complete with articulating mannequins, racks of dresses, sewing machine, and dressing rooms.
Sandy Shinner's direction of Lydia Stryk's new play, The Glamour House, results in a performance that is entertaining and theatrical of a work that is much less than it plays.
--Sandra Marie Lee
The Glamour House. Lydia Stryk's drama, offered in its world premiere under Sandy Shinner's direction. Victory Gardens Theater, first-floor main stage, 2257 N. Lincoln, 773-871-3000. Through December 23: Tuesdays-Fridays, 8 PM; Saturdays, 5 and 8:30 PM; Sundays, 3 PM; Wednesday, December 5, 2 PM only; no show Thursday, November 22, and Tuesday, December 4. $28-$33
|
