Beau Jest’s ‘Journey To The Center Of The Stage’ a Loving Tribute to Theater (and Larry)

(Kathleen Lewis and Robin JaVonne Smith)

 

by Mike Hoban

 

LARRY’S PLAY: JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE STAGE – Written by Larry Coen; Directed by Davis Robinson. Presented by Beau Jest Moving Theatre at the Charlestown Working Theater, 442 Bunker Hill St., Charlestown through September 16

 

If you’re a theater person – and by that I mean an actor, director, designer, stage manager or even a frequent audience member – you really should make every effort to get over to the Charlestown Working Theater to see Larry’s Play: Journey To The Center Of The Stage. And if you’re not, you probably should still go, especially if you’ve ever wondered what goes on behind the scenes in the theater. But if you were a friend or a fan of the late, great Larry Coen, this is something you absolutely should not miss, as you can almost literally feel his presence in the room in this hilarious and often touching production.

 

Journey To The Center Of The Stage was an unpublished play written by Coen, a piece that founder and artistic director of the Beau Jest Moving Theater Davis Robinson (who directed) lovingly referred to in an article in Arts Fuse as, “a delightful back-stage romp full of inside theater jokes, larger-than-life characters, and a deep and abiding love for all of the people he considers part of his family: theater people,” after Coen’s unexpected passing last January.

 

(Lisa Tucker, Lewis, Smith)

 

And the description is apt. Journey is 10 short vignettes that depict the full range of the theater experience, giving us a glimpse into the lives of everyone from audience members to costumed Times Square ticket hawkers – and especially the actors themselves. Eerily, the play opens with Robert Deveau as the literal stage manager (not the Stage Manager) from Our Town talking about not only the deceased characters in that classic play, but the spirits that haunt every theater, a theme that surfaces again during a later piece, “The Curse of the Stage Hand”.

 

The next scene features veteran Beau Jest performers – Lauren Hallal, as a Broadway actress who gets replaced in previews during a pre-Broadway Boston run, and Lisa Tucker as her friend and dresser, in the touching  “In the Ladies Lounge of the Colonial Theater”. The scene shines a light on the insecurities and petty jealousies inherent to this hyper-competitive profession (as does a later bit featuring Robinson backstage as an aging actor in his 27th production of A Christmas Carol), but also shows the genuine warmth and community that develops backstage among theater folk.

 

(Davis Robinson)

 

The actor theme is dominant throughout, with newcomers Jeff Blanchette and Nick Funnell as two actors, vying for the same part, meeting up in a men’s room at an audition; Tucker and Robin JaVonne Smith as two seasoned actors getting ready for a performance of King Lear, horrifying the fresh-faced young Cordelia (Kathleen Lewis) with true-to-life backstage tales; and Lewis as a troubled child star coming back to see her children’s theater director (Tucker) as she’s hitting the skids.

 

But it’s not all about the actors, as Smith and Lewis are a scream as the Times Square ticket hawkers, and Hallal and Donna Asali delightfully depict a pair of theatergoers who are dismayed when they find out that A Streetcar Named Desire doesn’t have the “Clang-Clang-Clang Went the Trolley” musical number in it. As you may expect, there are a ton of in-jokes in the production, and it really helps to have been around the theater to catch them all, but it’s not a requirement to have a good time.

 

(Tucker, Lauren Hallal)

 

I was not a friend of Larry Coen’s (although I did experience him briefly during an extended Beau Jest physical comedy workshop I did with the troupe in the 90’s), but I was absolutely a fan. He had what any student or practitioner of comedy would immediately recognize as ‘the gift’ – the innate ability to make people laugh, seemingly with no effort – but I had no idea what a terrific writer he was. As expected, the pieces are very funny, but there is a genuine affection for the characters he writes about, and each scene has a legitimate beginning, middle and end – something that far too many comedy writers don’t begin to comprehend the importance of. I last saw him in the Gold Dust Orphan’s production, Whatever Happened to Baby Jesus? as the Bette Davis character, and he was wonderfully insane – which is how I would have remembered him had I not seen Journey.

 

There is limited seating available at the Charlestown Working Theater, so I suggest getting tickets as soon as possible. Larry Coen may not be in the cast, but his spirit is present in the theater and in the terrific performances by the cast, so you don’t want to miss this. For more information and tickets, go to: https://www.beaujest.com/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *