Many of the small theater companies in the city look for a niche in which they can define themselves, get some distance from their rivals and partners in the theater community. Muddy Waters, which lives in the Kranzberg Arts Center at Grand and Olive, for decades the Times Square corner of St. Louis, does it by building a season around a single author.
The 2009 season, which ends with its current production, was devoted to Edward Albee, so the classic "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" which opened last night to run through Nov. 22, follows "Three Tall Women" and "The Lady From Dubuque." Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller filled previous seasons; Eugene O'Neill will be next year's headliner.
When it comes to wolves, or woolfes, Meme Wolff, on stage as Martha, brings another spelling and some exceptional power to the role. She and her husband, George, a riveting performance by Alan Knoll, have brought life to their marriage and excitement to their bedroom through a lifetime of vicious games. One leads, the other follows, as they wander dangerous trails. There are verbal punches and counter-punches, reliance on every rhetorical trick and tactic in a series of search-and-destroy missions. Total humiliation is the goal. Truth is not a necessary prerequisite.
Knoll, an outstanding comic actor who has stretched his abilities to more serious work in the last few years, is dazzling. His little pouts are often more expressive than an entire speech would be, and both he and Wolff make the sudden changes from attacker to defender and back again in marvelous style.
George and Martha have been at a faculty party, return home about one-third drunk and with a a pair of newcomers in tow. Nick (Joshua Thomas) and Honey (Paris McCarthy) are about to get a lesson in the campus subtext. The men teach; the women are homemakers (we're in1962). McCarthy is very good as Honey, with a slight southern accent and an over-abundance of the gene for cute; Thomas has his moments, but if the role were a suit, it would need some extra alterations here and there. Martha is the daughter of the college president, using that accident of birth as a club and a net, hooking all the new hires, tossing most of them back.
It's obvious that George and Martha have played most of their little games as a series of singles matches, but there's room for mixed doubles, too.
Director Jerry McAdams has brought a slightly different approach to Albee's drama, but it works very well and defies easy description. The timing is flawless. The verbal violence that flares like summer lightning is a key to keeping the audience off-balance, and McAdams has orchestrated it beautifully and brought outstanding performances from Knoll and Wolff. Nora Palitz's set design was satisfactory, though the furniture looked a little more run-down than one expected. Nancy Crouse's costumes were proper.
At the Kranzberg Arts Center through Nov. 22
–Joe