Hay Fever

Critiqued by Holly Bartges

Hay Fever is an absurd allergy causing one’s eyes and nose to leak.

Miner Alley’s production of Hay Fever

No, NOT that Hay Fever. This one is an absurd Noel Coward comedy causing one’s nose and eyes to leak from sidesplitting laughter that doesn’t want to quit, even when it thinks it should.

This Hay Fever has spoiled me forever. After Opening Night’s performance at Miners Alley Playhouse, I don’t ever want to see this production again. Ever. Unless, of course, it features Deborah Persoff as Judith Bliss. I cannot fathom any actor, famous or not so, living or not so, riding Judith’s uninhibited, flamboyant, unbridled pony with the exuberant calculated flavor Persoff loans to Judith. The Judith she creates stands above and beyond any adjective known and unknown in the English language. She’s pure wondrous magic.

A less professional cast would throw up their hands, take a back seat, and say to director, Richard Pegg. “Let her loose. Let her romp. There’s no way we can keep up.” However, this is a cast who understands they wear their own theatrical expertise tightly buckled into place. They don’t have to take a back seat to anyone, not even Persoff.

If you thrive on stories and plots, forget Hay Fever. It doesn’t have one, doesn’t want one, and doesn’t need one. What it has is an impressionistic portrait of a rich, artistic family cuddled in a rich artistic make believe world living in Cookham, England in 1928. England thrives between the great wars. Peace and prosperity settle around England’s ears. The roaring ‘20’s soak England’s territory, and the Flappers can’t be stopped.

Eccentricity surrounds the Bliss home like a barbed wire fence. Herein live free spirits creating their own reality when they want, as they want.

A dramatic actress, Judith has just retired from the stage. As a dramatic actress, she rehearses her dramatics every minute of every day carrying her own spotlight wherever she goes, out into the garden, or across the room. It doesn’t matter. Her spot announces her arrival, hovering in the shadows when she vehemently waltzes out of sight.

Her husband, David doesn’t allow Judith to get into his way. A novelist, he carries his own arrogance snugly wrapped around his own designed universe. Claude Diener wears David as smoothly as a well fitted smoking jacket. He mustn’t be disturbed. He can’t be disturbed, not when a perfected novel flows through his fingertips. Well, yes, he can be disturbed for afternoon tea, and when skirts of a particular fabric catch his eye.

Judith and David’s children, Sorel, beautifully played by Misha Johnson, and Simon, played by Nathan Bock in laidback playboy style, have grown up accepting their parents’ flamboyant lifestyle, even understanding them, certainly enjoying the wealth of their surroundings, and manage to hold on to a sense of reality engulfing them. Both contain a playful sense of humored teasing. Early in the play, Sorel wistfully observes, “We never attempt to look after people who come here. We never ask if they’ve slept well.”

Unbeknownst to everyone else in the family, all four invited friends for the weekend.

Sorel invited Richard Greatham (Verle Hite). Her words punctuated with over extended poses, Judith tries to remember why she doesn’t want to see Richard. She invited Sandy Tyrell, (Derby Thomas) who “is a perfect darling and madly in love with me”. Almost as an afterthought muses “I must tell Richard not to come.” Simon announces he has invited Myra Arundel, (Kendra Crain McGovern) to which Judith asks in a pretentious motherly voice, “Why can’t you invite nice young girls instead of self-righteous vampires?”

Miner Alley’s production of Hay Fever

Mercy! Where are these people going to stay? Everyone has their eye on the Japanese room. Simon deliberately remarks that it’s a women’s room because of the décor. No one seems to pay any attention. The squabbling grabs David’s attention who wants to know what the noise is all about. He announces he has invited a Flapper, Jackie Coryton (Leslie Randall Chapman), and she will stay in the Japanese Room.

One longtime member of the household remains aloof and disinterested, lives in the real world, and throws her cynicism around as freely as Judith throws her pretentious posing. Clara, the Maid deliciously played by Peggy Miller grabs a laugh every time she enters the room. This is Miller’s strongest role I’ve seen and she’s brilliant. First, horrified to hear there will be 8 people for meals over the weekend. Nothing like last minute information. Each time the doorbell rings, Clara stomps to the front door, opens it, sees who’s there, closes the door, and stomps out of the room. Either the Bliss family is so use to her, or they are so wrapped up in their own make believe world no one objects to her impudent behavior. Miller as Clara is a prize.

Hite gives Richard a womanizing, man- of-the-world aristocratic flair. He just knows every woman wants to fall at his feet. McGovern provides Myra with a touch of snobbishness, biting words for Judith, tries to be compliant, but her pretentiousness stands outside her grasp.

Sandy floats into the house thinking he has the world by the tail. His balloon gets popped when Judith mentions David. In shock, Sandy exclaims he thought her husband dead. In a deadpan melodramatic manner, Judith brushes it aside. ”No, he’s not dead. He’s upstairs.” Discomfort rolls over Sandy like Clara’s rolling pin to dough when making pies. Thomas fields Sandy’s emotions as natural as the Bliss family is unnatural. Delightful.

Does the Flapper swoop in with stars in her eyes and the Charleston beating time with her feet? Hardly. Dressed conservatively, hair tightly pulled back, Chapman’s Jackie immediately senses she is a mouse in a roomful of cats. No air of sophistication here. Rather, there’s an air of embarrassment for being alive. Chapman is as wonderful in her uptightness as Clara is with her cynicism, as Judith is with her rambunctious theatrical posing.

The characters play their own version of Twister as relationships bond and “unbond” with flirtatious extravagance. So blissfully wrapped up in their own bliss, the Bliss family takes no notice when the wide-eyed guests tip toe through the tulips out the front door.

The entire cast is sterling silver. Pegg drew the characters out of the actors to total perfection and then turned them loose to claim their own chemistry.

Pegg also designed the set with its haughty expensive elegant white look. It’s clear from the beginning no dogs or cats live in this house. Animals yes, dogs and cats no. The set is perfect for the Bliss family’s hyper sense of elegance.

Ann Piano’s costume design takes the breath away. They’re gorgeous from Simon’s casual dress, to Sorel’s stylish pant outfits, to Judith’s outrageous dramatic statements, to Jackie’s conservative attire. When it’s party time, the costumes sparkle with flair. Even Jackie loosens up to style.

Coward wrote Hay Fever after spending a weekend with a well- known English actor when he was 25 years old. Some documents say he wrote the play in three days, some say seven. It hardly matters. It’s a miraculous piece of writing in a short period of time. If the script was played straight, it would fall on its face. This is not a play for novices by any stretch of the imagination. It emphasizes every day situations while the characters react smugly to situations that do not exist. A combination of farce and comedy of errors, it was designed to showcase larger than life celebrated actors. It demands actors who can wrap snugly into outlandish characters with free abandonment. This cast does it. Has it. Gives it.

Miss this production and you’ll miss a Grand Treat designed for high laughability, designed for ultimate entertainment, designed for a feast for the eyes, designed as gift to the audience with laugh-out-loud punctuation.

Don’t wait. Call now for reservations. Miners Alley reached for the stars, caught one, and enticed it to live on stage for a short while.

Hay Fever
By Noel Coward
Directed by Richard H. Pegg