You Can’t Take It With You

Reviewed by Holly Bartges

Realistic, down to earth, honest Third now playing at The Space Theatre at the Bonfils Complex in DPCA, explores and uncovers truth behind the wanting to pigeon hole people into black and white boxes.

Randy Moore as Grandpa Martin Vanderhof and Jeanne Paulsen as Penelope Sycamore in the Denver Center Theatre Company season opening production of You Can’t Take It With You. Photo by Terry Shapiro

If the Sycamores are mad, then mad is definitely what is needed.

The Sycamores will be thrilled to have you visit them in their 1935 living room living exquisitely designed by William Bloodgood on the Stage Theatre for the Denver Center Theatre Company’s magical production of Moss Hart and George Kaufman’s award winning production of You Can’t Take It With You.

These are not mad people. They are free spirits doing what they love doing. Never mind they may not be good at what they do. Greatness never enters their mind as playwrights, artists, printers, musicians, or inventers. They love the process without conniving to become over night sensations or the next American Idol.

You Can’t Take It With You proved to be exactly what the doctor ordered when it opened on Broadway in 1936 as America began to climb out of the frightening, demoralizing Great Depression.

With a production as bright and alive as this one, it can plant magic square in the midst of even the most pessimistic, desperate soul.

In follow-up conversations, nostalgia creeps in. Nostalgia for a time in reality that never existed. If there were Sycamores in the time of the Great Depression, they hid themselves very well.

Communes in the 1960’s attempted to create the atmosphere. I had the privilege of visiting two, both in New Mexico, including the once famous Hog Farm that provided a goodly amount of food in their psychedelic magical touring bus for Woodstock. The pretense of freedom stood out, but only a pretense.

Director Penny Metropolos unleashed a child-like playful spirit in most of the 19 cast members. Five of the actors needed to have their screws tightened in the midst of the playful free-for-all. Projecting tightened screws takes as much theatrical expertise as taking off the leash.

You Can’t Take It With You connects the audience with legitimate warm fuzzies lasting for several days. Honest humor spills from the stage enveloping the entire theatre. At times very honest funny flows along with the humor. These aren’t funny people pointing to their ÒfunninessÓ. These are people melded into a family who have created a soft landing, bubbling with its own brand of “funniness.”

75 year old Martin Vanderhof saw it all coming and threw it out of his life, quitting his job 40 years ago, deciding to do what he wanted to do when he wanted to do it, not only allowing his family, but encouraging them, to follow suit.

Randy Moore’s character development for Vanderhof becomes so mischievously magical he conjures up the wanting to be everyone’s grandfather. He’s a character you wish everyone could take home, at least for a day. A day would give him just enough time to reveal the exact location of the magic switch.

However, Moore provides enough of the real down to earth electric essence of being in love with life, choosing to enjoy it rather then fight against it, to be carried home.

A typewriter mistakenly delivered to the Sycamore home eight years before inspired Penelope Sycamore, Vanderhof’s daughter, to write plays, none of which she finishes. She also loves to dabble with the paintbrush, even though her canvases never get completed. Jeanne Paulsen fills Penelope with carefree organization. Following her whims with blithe abandonment, Paulsen gives Penelope the organizational overview she easily knows what’s going on with her family all of the time. Paulsen’s performance as Penelope is simply sheer unadulterated joy.

Penelope’s daughter, Essie Sycamore Carmichael, dreams of becoming a ballerina, dancing at every opportunity. When she walks across a room, setting the table, reading a book, talking to her husband Ed, making candy, she dances. She’s not good, will never be good. The family knows it, her teacher, Boris Kalenkhov, knows it. Who cares? Christine Rowan takes Essie for a colorful chorographical stretch on her toes. It takes a highly disciplined actor to do something badly on stage well coupled with an exquisitely developed character. Rowan projects a complete picture with brilliance.

David Ivers brings Ed Carmichael to full fun-loving life. Fascinated with the printing press, he prints everything striking his fancy. He delights in printing intriguing sayings to include with Essie’s candy he delivers. Meaning holds little significance. It’s the good sounding phrases that get him in trouble with FBI agents. He prints the family menu, skimpish as it may be. He doesn’t care what he prints. He also plays the xylophone at the drop of a hat, often to Essie’s misguided dances. The printer and the xylophone both live in the spacious living room.

James Michael Reilly lives in the explosive tinker’s world of Paul Sycamore, Penelope’s husband. Living in the basement most of the time manufacturing fireworks, he takes booming risks. Tinkering is the ribbon tying heart and soul together. When he isn’t in the basement, he tinkers with what else? Erector sets. Reilly captures the inquisitive, curious child-like Paul atmosphere with dignified rambunctious ambition.

Paul’s assistant, Mr. DePinna delivered ice several years before, came in to talk with Paul, never left. Larry Paulsen’s grasp of this delightful eccentric rocks the house with outlandish devil-may-care fool heartiness.

Ailish Riggs’ portrayal of the Sycamore’s very pregnant maid and cook, Reba, attracts attention whenever she waddles into the room. Compliant, never complaining, at home with the madhouse, Rigg’s Reba is considered part of the family, and knows it. Her boyfriend, Donal, deliciously played by Richard Thierlot, loves cornflakes, and loves Reba. Slightly at loose ends, the family settles in with him as one of their own.

What appears to be the most civilized in the entire family is Alice Sycamore who works on Wall Street, and richly together played by Nisi Sturgis. Sturgis brings out the complexity of Alice’s dilemma. She loves her family dearly, thoroughly enjoys their crazy antics, at the same time fields public embarrassment for their bizarre behavior. When Alice falls head over heels in love with Tony Kirby, a Wall Street straight shooter, played straight and narrow by Patrick Jones, complications take command. Engaged to Tony, Alice dances a tangoed two-step when it becomes necessary for her family to meet Tony’s parents.

As loose as a goose her family is, his parents stand on the far end of the spectrum meeting society’s social expectations all of the way. Under his Wall Street training, sits a playful elf wanting to get out. Tony sees to it his parents arrive for dinner on the wrong night. Jones wraps himself snugly in the Wall Street tone of expectations, but the elf twinkles from his eyes.

John Hutton’s controlled theatrical power serves him well as Tony’s uptight, snobbish father, Mr. Kirby keeps his life in as strict order as his society dished framework on Wall Street, raising expensive orchids as a hobby. Lauren Klein, as Mrs. Kirby maintains her prim, proper, social structure bound to a lead pipe glued to her spine. For acceptability, she follows the fads without much of a hair-brained thought to significance. At the moment she flaunts spiritualism. Klein shows Mrs. Kirby as a conundrum in proper dress.

Penelope meets Gay Wellington by happenchance. Jill Tanner would be a scene-stealer playing this over-the-top exaggerated actress, if it were possible for anyone in this cast to steal anything from anyone. Seeing it as fate, Penelope brings her home to read one of her plays. Tanner’s Gay knows how to drink, get drunk, pass out wherever she happens to be, creating a good deal of laughter as the Sycamores go on about their merry mirth of life around her.

Mike Hartman captures the wondrous Boris Kolenkhov with spicy Russian explosiveness only to rival Paul and Mr. DePinna. Shortly before the revolution, Boris managed to escape to America. Deeply concerned about the Russia he loves, his obsession over politics keeps him frazzled. Hartman lends him heartfelt believable sympathy with his ranting, as does the Sycamores. Off the wall, but not out of control in his political craze his humanity seeps in. As Essie’s dance instructor, he knows she is not good, and never will be. He comprehends something much more important, how much she loves to dance. That, he gives to her. Hartman combines the frazzled crazed Russian politics with the softer side with expert gentility.

Sam Gregory grabs initial attention as William C Henderson, a staunch, suited IRS agent who arrives to find out why Grandpa Vanderhof hasn’t responded to the numerous letters sent him, and why he hasn’t paid his taxes. Grandpa, unfettered by the intrusion, stands firmly at ease with a very simple answer. He just doesn’t believe in paying taxes. Period.

When the Kirby’s arrive on the wrong night for dinner, The Sycamores fly around in their usual state of happy, cozily wrapped in chaos. Alice calls off the engagement, knowing full well the marriage between her and Tony could work, but the marriage between the Sycamores and the Kirbys wouldn’t. Wall Street hasn’t completely encased Tony. There’s a method to his madness. The playful loving community Alice lives in is a feast he wants “to-table-himself-to.”

Ah, the table, the table becomes the magical connection for this outrageous, loving, free spirited, non-judgmental family where everyone understands their connection to themselves and each other, where everyone sits at equal level where everyone is a part creating the whole, no matter what it is they have to eat.

With too much food left over from the dinner party that never happened, Boris with his connection to once vital, important Russian royal society, introduces the family to the once Grand Duchess Olga Katrina who now works with pride in tact as a waitress.

With this large cast, and legitimate dramatic business taking place on stage all of the time, the chemistry between the actors ties the chemistry between the characters into a total complete portrait. No one slides into the background, no one gets over-looked. Everyone stands out all of the time, no small trick for a director or a cast. This show demands awesome powerful actors and a creative insightful director. This production contains all of the elements to rival any production of this play any time or place. It is difficult to imagine anyone doing it any better.

However, when Kathleen Brady, makes her entrance in full Grand Duchess Olga style, the universe nearly comes to a sliding halt. Not only by the characters, but the audience as well. A Grand Duchess she once was, a Grand Duchess she is, wrapped in the heart and soul of an honest down to earth human being who loves to cook. Making herself immediately at home, in the magical atmosphere the Sycamore’s created, chances are really quite good that beyond the last page of this script, beyond the bringing up of the house lights, the Sycamores continue to embrace The Grand Duchess as part of their family She, in turn, returns the embracing as Olga, a Russian immigrant who loves to cook, knowing she is indeed The Grand Duchess.

In spite of their madcap world, the grand appeal of the Sycamores is their phenomenal ability to see people as people no matter what their plight, or politics. Prejudice isn’t a word they learned. Judgment doesn’t live under their roof. “Live and let life” is the philosophy Grandpa Vanderhof lives by. He doesn’t have to lecture it. He doesn’t have to drum it into anyone’s head. He just is and he just does. Consequently, so does everyone else. Moore’s performance turns Grandpa into a marvel, and that, undoubtedly is the real magic of this production. No need to do what they did. Capturing their ownership of humanity, inviting “live and let live” without prejudice, without judgment would be true charismatic enchantment.

Deb Trout’s costume design signals the essence of each character with hilarity, to ownership, to expectations to outrageous, to perfection. Richard M. Scholwin’s sound design rattles the roof when called upon to do so. He knows how to make an audience jump. Don Darnutzer’s lighting design ties everything together with a glowing brilliance, highlighting and subduing whenever the electric magic requires, completing the madcap family portrait.

To miss this show would be to walk away from a gift gilded in gold.