Posted on Sun, Sep. 2, 2007
Sweetie Pie. Madi Distefano, whose wacky trailer-trash musical called Eye-95 was a hit of the first Fringe and, again, in an update last year; chose the same setting – mythical Metro City – for her new play. Azuka Theatre is presenting Sweetie Pie, about the high-accident intersection of fame and chance.
The play, about a boy who knows little of his past, the mother who never saw him, and the rock-star life of both, is an update of a Greek tragedy. I won't say which one, because the single-paragraph Fringe description doesn't, either, and the 80-minute show's more fun when it's a surprise. Somewhere along the 80-minute plot, you'll get it.
In its first half, Sweetie Pie seemed surprisingly flat. On opening night, Saturday, it unfolded awkwardly on the stage of Plays & Players, then seemed to heat up suddenly. Some of this seemed to do with an occasional Fringe problem: not enough rehearsal. The Greek chorus, five suits who follow the action and comment on it, was rag-tag, rarely beginning lines in unison and, therefore, hard to grasp. Too bad, because the commentary Distefano provided the chorus is droll, with an amusing attention to trite metaphor – and it moves the plot along.
Distefano herself overdoes her initial role as a nasty stepmother, but comes fully into her own when she portrays the unwed mom who long-ago produced Our Hero and now, all grown up, commands rocks stages like a queen. Melissa Lynch plays four minor roles, all convincingly, and Tom Tansey makes an excellent nasty dad and, later, a grown-up whom life passes by.
As for Mark, the boy snatched from his high-school mom and destined to be the king of rock and roll, Tobias Segal brings both a sweet vulnerability and a streak of defiance to the roll; he's your basic waif waiting to be adopted by the world. - Howard Shapiro
$20. 7 p.m. tomorrow through Sunday and Sept. 11-15. Plays and Players, 1714 Delancey St.
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