Davis Production's Greater Tuna at Viad Playhouse on the Park
(out
of 
)Mark S.P. Turvin
(home office) (602) 912-0117
I can be reached for comment via e-mail at: mspt@goldfishpublishers.com
Reviewed 7/11/98
(out
of )In a battle of the Tuna's, Davis Productions is mounting their version of the 1982 hit play Greater Tuna just as another local company has ended theirs. This production, utilizing the talents of local funny-men Bob Sorenson and Jon Gentry and the direction of avant garde theatriko Jim Linde seemed a sure hit. Somewhere along the line, though, this evening of Greater Tuna wound up canned.
Admittedly, this play is not one I find hilariously funny (read: it would take a lot to make me enjoy this comedy). It uses well-worn stereotypes, negative images of Texas (as if we don't have enough of those), and an odd dash of drama, and mixes them together in a long-running joke about the small town of Tuna, Texas, and the odd types that have congregated there. There's all your expected weirdoes, kooks, and eccentrics, from the radio weatherman who gets into his work a tad too much, the local NRA honcho, the Humane Society eccentric, and the guy who reports seeing UFO's after a particularly heavy night of drinking. An entire family is at the center, and each character is more cardboard than the last.
Of course, the charm of this play is that each of the twenty or so characters, man and beast, is played by one of two people. Drama comes just as much from whether or not an actor will complete a significant costume change as from the interactions. To this end, Mr. Sorenson and Mr. Gentry seem the perfect choices for the roles, and Mr. Linde, who has performed the play twice himself, seems a shoo-in for the directing spot. Whether it's bad chemistry or low wattage between the three, the play is instead performed in an underwhelming way. My suspicion, having seen what heights these two actors are able to achieve when heading over-the-top, is that Mr. Linde has reigned them back much too far, taking away some of the zaniness of the piece. This is a deathknell in farce.
There are some funny moments, and the characters are each played (perhaps a bit too) earnestly by Messrs. Sorenson and Gentry. There are even a few poignant moments, especially those of Mr. Sorenson's portrayal of the errant Stanley Bumiller, newly returned from Reform School, and Mr. Gentry's ultra-conservative, but slowly cracking wife-and-mother Bertha Bumiller. For some reason, though, few of the gags explode. Most just fizzle and others seem tentative. Would that Mr. Linde had allowed these two comic thoroughbreds to gallop rather than trot.
A good example of this is the start of the second act, when each actor, in drag, portrays an older woman with a past involving each other and the corpse they are viewing. The scene has the potential for belly laughs, yet the actors underplay to the point of subtlety, something this show seems to have no room for. The result was a disappointment, as was much of this over-the-top-yet-underplayed production. Underscoring this was the sudden energetic entrance of Mr. Gentry's Baptist Reverend Spikes. There was so much power and energy in his short performance, emphasizing what seemed to be lacking from the rest of the evening.
Mr. Linde's set design was clever and appropriate. The use of the farm house buildings with a dreamily painted roadscape set the perfect mood for the piece. Michael Eddy's lighting, despite a few technical glitches, worked very well, as did Jeff Steele's enjoyable, though sometimes too loud, sound design.
This production of Greater Tuna is disappointing in
many ways, though one could sense that a simple release by the
two gifted performers could change this disappointment to delight.
While stereotype-knocking and conservative-bashing could make
for an enjoyable, if shallow, evening, there's something rotten
in Tuna this time around.
Production Details:
Greater Tuna by Jaston Williams, Joe Sears and Ed Howard
Davis Productions at Viad Playhouse on the Park, Phoenix
505-5555
July 10th-August 2nd, 1998