Music From A Sparkling Planet

Reviewed by Holly Bartges

Bernie Cardell directed The Firehouse Theatre Company’s current charming comedy, Music From A Sparkling Planet. Written by Douglas Carter Beane. Sparkling Planet plays with time, nostalgia for once-upon-a-time television heroes, anxiety over the future, and anxiety over solving pressing immediate problems. Playing at The John Hand Theatre (Lowry), Cardell melds together a highly talented cast with a knack toward honest gentle comedy knitted together with tragedy individuals bring upon themselves.

Joel Sutliffe, Andy Anderson, Jessica Clare, Gene Kato in Firehouse Theater Company’s Music From A Sparkling Planet. Photo by Duane Brown

Onstage, the past, present, and future get rolled out all at the same time. So clear cut is the direction, Sparkling Planet never leaves one wondering what decade one wanders through.

Nestled in a bar, three guys, best buddies, force play TV trivia. Force play because each one is burdened with a relationship issue. It isn’t macho for macho guys to commiserate over issues. So they brood, pout on the inside, laughing too loudly on the outside.

Andy Anderson plays Miller, a gay man, worrying with bravado, over his partner in the hospital. Gene Kato takes Wags for a ride while confused over moving in with his significant other, Wags wants to let it all out as Miller steers him into trivia heaven. Hoagie, wonderfully played by Joel Sutliffe, lives in his own world always a few paces behind the others.

The three are orchestrated as a high-class jazz trio, feeding off each other, feeding into each other with synchronized hilarity. Distinct personalities caught up in the male syndrome of avoiding feelings, diving into idiotic superficial conversation. Keep the trivia rolling, keep the laughter flowing, “C’mon Wags, this isn’t the time to mope.”Pushing out the trivia questions, the three become obsessed over Tamara Tomorrow. As young boys, she mesmerized them with her rocket ship mentality, and outer space costume. Always upbeat, always “rah-rahing” the future, making off the cuff broad smiled predictions before introducing cartoon favorites such as Aztec Boy, and Speed Racer.

In the ’70s, Tamara was a TV icon little boys melted over, panted over, found their tongues hanging out over, including a few other body parts.

Now the three contemporary musketeers begin to wonder: where is she? What is she doing? Why was her show cancelled so suddenly? Why was she on the air one day, and gone the next? Oh, wow, how they would like to meet her. What if they could find her? What if they could see her, talk to her, and let her know how much she meant to them.

While they battle over trivia, remembering innocent days of child hood believing every word of Tamara’s off-the-cuff hopeful comments and spontaneous predictions. If they could find her, maybe their future would spark some hope in their desolate desert.

While musing over their trivia game and dreaming about their golden girl, Tamara’s rise as a television celebrity gets played out on the opposite side of the stage.

Jessica Clare grabs hold of the eager, energetic, Tamara persona and rides her for all she’s worth. Robert Payo engulfs himself with the quiet spoken Andy, Tamar’s TV producer and secret lover. With TV political smarts, he convinces her to do what she doesn’t want to do, dangling stardom in front of her as a carrot to Peter Rabbit.

Of course they fall in love. Of course, he is married. Of course he promises her the world on a string without any intention of having a string to tie the world to.

The disillusioned reality check sends Tamara into a tailspin and to the bottle.

Ability to create space for laughter in the midst of tragedy rides close on the heels of reality. Comedic aptitudes bed comfortably with tragic disappointments.

Clare’s transformation from the sparkling TV personality Tamara Tomorrow from a far far away galaxy to 20 years later as a recovered alcoholic, a cynical, disillusioned alone woman hiding as a reservation clerk in an out of the way motel is stunning, With a shake of the head, one wants to believe there are really two very different actors commanding the role.

Her eyes droop, the body droops, lips spike with cynicism. Reality as she once knew it slapped her in the face. No costume or make-up could aid this transformation. It comes strictly from the artist’s own expertise. One either has it or one doesn’t. Clare’s got it.

The set designed by Mike Haas on five levels offers opportunity to corral the past, preset and future into one arena, where all three transpire at the same time.

There’s Wags, a lawyer screwing up his relationship.

Hoagie, very much a part of the threesome, and yet slightly missing a few levels on his elevator, a few beats behind the punch lines, deadpan, hysterical.

Miller wound up in his gay relationship, confused, his world unraveling.

Somehow, in this comedy, the naive child-like innocence carries the three into unknown territory of fantasy resolve. Their enthusiastic persistence lights a spark buried deep inside the burned out cynical Tamara magically bringing her back to life. This time, however, experience has left her with confident wisdom of her own to lean against.

With the many scenes bobbing back and forth from present to past to present to future, the actors keep the pace at a high speed without missing a beat.

Music From A Sparkling Planet plays cute, fun, hysterical, charming with delightful strong character development. This production is definitely worth a night of soft, relaxing humored entertainment, companioned with its own nudge toward audience nostalgia for another time peering into futuristic unknown territory.