LEE HARTGRAVE TONIGHT

GREAT CAST! Courtesy Photo

WHY torture is WRONG - and the people who LOVE THEM

HEADLINE

WHY TORTURE IS WRONG, AND THE PEOPLE WHO LOVE THEM

Directed by Claire Rice

Hey – this play is every Broadway Actor you ever wanted to see on the stage. I’m overwhelmed with this evening at the Custom Made Theatre that’s fun and frothy. This show is like a billion firecrackers going off every few seconds. Yes, Torture me – I love it and I love the talent in this Bay Area Premier Comedy.

Who is Christopher Durang? Well, he was born in Montclair, New Jersey. He attended Catholic schools as a child, including the Our Lady of Peach School in New Providence, New Jersey. He received a B.A. in English from Harvard and an M.F.A. in playwriting from Yale School of Drama. He's been with a partner for many, many years.

His work deals with Roman Catholic  dogma and culture and homosexuality. Durang’s plays have been on Broadway and Off-0ff Broadway. He has a fabulous collection of one-act parodies. One of them is the hysterical “For Whom The Southern Bell Tolls” (a parody of The Glass Menagerie by (Tennessee Williams.)

Durang’s Torture play keeps the audience laughing at this uproarious comedy about an ongoing ‘war on terror’. The father is not only looking to catch a strange guy that married his daughter by letting her get drunk. They both get so drunk that they don’t even remember that they got married that evening. Daddy, is not happy. He pursues the young non-working young guy. The Dad thinks that his daughter has married a terrorist.

The mother is just hysterically emotional. In this house she can only wear yellow, orange and red. Daddy, you see, won’t let Mom wear any other colors. You wonder – is the mother a theater-loving eccentric – or is she really insane. She greets everyone that comes in the door by Greeting them with “Do you love the Theatre? Yes, I would say that she is insane but funny as hell.

Hey, this play is richly enjoyable. It’s a winner! Durang and The Custom Made Theatre score again! Impossible to resist!

NOW PLAYING AT THE CUSTOM MADE THEATRE ON GOUGH STREET

RATING: “Four Glasses of Champagne!!!! (highest rating) –trademarked-

This is the funiest black comedy that I have seen AND THE BEST ACTING I'VE SEEN IN YEARS: They Are: Eden Neuendorf, Sal Mattos, Jennie Brick, Paul Stout, Jonathon Brooks, Teri Whipple and Christopher P. Kelly. "Hands -down the best new play in San Francisco. I'm hooked and you'll be hooked as well! It's a swift blast!" 


(((Lee Hartgrave has contributed many articles to the San Francisco Chronicle Sunday Datebook Section and he Produced and Hosted a long running Arts Segment on PBS KQED)))