In her notes for playwright Sarah Ruhl specifies that “everyone in this play should be able to tell a really good joke,” a skill that eludes the cast in the production.
The script, a finalist for the 2005 Pulitzer prize, is witty and sharp, but on the Town Hall Arts Center’s small stage, the words deflate, victims of misjudged timing and a collective listlessness.
“The Clean House” opens with Matilde (Viviane Rinaldi), a Brazilian who arrives to the U.S. in the wake of her parents’ deaths, hoping for a career as a stand-up comic but resigned to being a live-in maid for a pair of married physicians named Lane and Charles.
In another production, this might be hilarious, but here, Matilde’s predicament seems sort of sad. She doesn’t like housework, so she just doesn’t do it. Could she be a promising comedian? Who knows? She tells her jokes in Portuguese.
Lane (Charla Mason Kelly, invoking her inner nag) frequently returns from the hospital to find Matilde lounging idly, untroubled by clutter, dust and piles of laundry.
Lane’s sister Virginia (LuAnn Buckstein), a compulsive cleaner, cheerfully offers to shoulder Matilde’s load. This arrangement works well until Lane figures out what’s going on. Lane’s enlightenment coincides with the women’s discovery that Charles is having an affair.
Are we at the funny part yet?
Then Charles brings his love interest, Ana (Nita Froslich), on stage, eager in the giddiness of infatuation to share his joy with — who else? — his wife. And still the comic potential remains buried in the script, while the cast exchanges awkward but humorless civilities.
This bleak production feels like “The Clean House” as interpreted by Chekov or Ingmar Bergman.
Maybe the cast is still recuperating from the virus that forced the show to delay a week before opening. The actors each are competent, but they don’t seem to be fully engaged. Last weekend, the audience was ready to laugh, but lines that should have elicited guffaws found only polite chuckles.
LuAnn Buckstein, as clean-freak Virginia, is the most energetic of the lot, mining as much humor out of her part as she can. But she can’t get rid of the gloomy miasma, even when Virginia undergoes a version of a therapeutic cleanse.
Claire Martin: 303-954-1477, cmartin@denverpost.com or twitter.com/byclairemartin
“THE CLEAN HOUSE” Written by Sarah Ruhl. Directed by Robert Wells. Starring LuAnn Buckstein, Daymond Caylo, Nina Froelich, Charla Mason Kelly and Viviane Rinaldi. Through Feb. 1 at Town Hall Arts Center, 2450 W. Main St., Littleton. Tickets $23 and up at 303-794-2787 or online at TownHallArtsCenter.org
Cleaned out
Town Hall Arts Center’s “The Clean House” falls short of its comedic potential.
