Neil Simon’s ‘Lost in Yonkers’ @ Richardson Theatre Centre
Photos courtesy of Richardon Theatre Centre
—Amy Saucer
Neil Simon fans will delight in Richardson Theatre Centre’s production of Lost in Yonkers, directed by Rachel Lindley and Deborah Key. The setting is an apartment in the eponymous Yonkers, the year is 1942, and the accents are nicely authentic. We are treated to ten challenging months that 15 “and a half” year-old Jay (Zachary Carvajal) and 11 “and a half” year-old Arty (Aubrey Goodman) spend with their wicked grandmother and wacky aunt.
The play opens to the two brothers squirming, hot and miserable in their Sunday best while they wait for their father to emerge from his talk with Grandma Kurnitz (Karen Jordan). The boys rarely visit. Arty complains that kissing her is like kissing a wrinkled ice cube. The brothers’ tight-knit relationship is revealed through their exchange of amusing dialogue.
Carvajal imbues Jay with instant credibility as a good egg, and also does a great job with Jay’s bouts of anguish and anger. Goodman’s one-liners bring laughs throughout the production. He effectively times the spaces between words, delivering them with comic emphasis.
Eddie (Kevin Michael Fuld), the boy’s stressed father, emerges to snarl and fret over the impression their clothes and posture will make on his mother. Carvajal’s reactions and concern telegraph Jay’s loyalty to Pop, the boys’ only surviving parent. Their mother, who recently died of cancer, said there was something wrong with everyone on Pop’s side of the family. In one way, Lost in Yonkers is an exploration of that truth.
The exuberant Aunt Bella (Amy Knoles) makes a cheery entrance in an asymmetrical dress with misaligned ric-rac trim. She spent a year making it herself, which is one of many data points indicating that, as Jay jokes, Aunt Bella is a little closed for repairs. Frequently brimming with affection, Bella suffers from memory lapses and lack of emotional control, as for example when she blows up at her nephews over their refusal of ice cream.
The play explores what can go wrong and right among family members, with the relationship among Eddie and his sons being a high point of loving devotion. Grandma’s four surviving children all dealt with her physical and emotional abuse in different ways. Eddie cowered, but survived with his fundamental decency intact.
This decency is reflected in Jay, who sweetly explains, “you don’t have to be old to be trusted.” In the boys’ comically awkward scenes with Aunt Bella, we see how Jay, for all of his joking, is compassionate and sensitive enough to tell the morally correct white lies. This play is Neil Simon at his best: the dialogue is funny, frequently poignant, and incrementally revealing of the characters’ underlying relationships and motives.
Fuld skillfully makes Eddie likeable, though he has to explain that he did something wrong. In an anguished scene Eddie confesses to the boys the financial trouble they’re in: Eddie resorted to a loan shark to pay his late wife’s hospital bills. No bank would help, only a loan shark—“my desperation was his collateral.”
When fearsome Grandma finally appears, Jordan’s performance lives up to the hype. “Grandma is fast with a cane,” someone says in describing her parenting philosophy. “Everyone in Yonkers is afraid of Grandma,” one of her children attests.
The prevailing excuse is that she hates crying and weakness, and did what was necessary to make her children strong, as she herself had to be to survive a brutal childhood in Germany. “Responsibility is what makes meanness,” is Grandma’s explanation. During an ugly confrontation, daughter Bella finally lands a verbal blow that triggers the truth. A traumatic loss caused Grandma to close herself off. It makes sense as an explanation, but the productions asks: Is it an excuse? The play premiered in 1990 when a degree of corporal punishment was still acceptable, at least in some quarters. Now Grandma might be incarcerated for child abuse.
Both Jordan and Knoles do fantastic work with their difficult characters, and the vicious fight between them is particularly well played. Bella can no longer stand confined, limited life she’s been forced to live, and a fantasy sparks her ultimate showdown with her overbearing, cruel mother.
Megan Tormey is well cast as the terrified Aunt Gert, whose Grandma-induced speech impediment is a powerful illustration of the trauma this family has endured. Tormey’s patrician elegance in the chic period dresses reveal (without direct explanation) how she was able to escape.
Joe Cucinotti is also perfectly cast as Uncle Louie, whose appearance is the engine for both comedy and suspense. Fans of Richard Dreyfuss’ star turn in the hit movie will not be disappointed: there’s a definite resemblance. Louie is a “henchman” hiding out from underworld figures over “a minor neighborhood problem,” he assures his nephews. He is a fluent liar, but also charms with magic tricks and hilarious bravado. He’s the one who seems least affected by Grandma, and describes her intimidating manner—“eyes like two district attorneys”—with grudging respect. Louie remembers being locked in a closet for hours for breaking a ten-cent dish, adding that brother Eddie “never broke nothing except maybe himself.” In his confrontational scene with his mother, Louie bluntly tells her that she made him the man he is, that they are partners.
The set (designer Greg Smith) realistically reproduces the living and dining room of a 1940’s urban apartment (upstairs from the family candy shop), replete with wainscoting, green wallpaper, and windows that frame the shops and buildings across the street. Floral cushions adorn the stuffed sleeper sofa, and doilies hang off the backs of chairs. The bric-a-brac includes some still-life paintings, a ceramic cow wearing a floppy hat, and a fruit bowl full of (fake?) grapes. Every bit of the set helps ground the audience in the time period.
Costumer Ainsley Horan also serves up wonderful period details. The boys have vests under their suits, and Arty sports argyle socks that show beneath his little-kid “short pants.” Louie’s garnet-red shirt coordinates with a flashy tie and the feather in his fedora.
The sound design (Rusty Harding) balances clarity and fun: the audience can hear the accented dialogue well, but also swing along with the “Chattanooga Choo-Choo.” The lighting design (from Kenneth Hall) adroitly shifts between the lit and unlit living room, and puts a spotlight on Eddie as he recites comic vignettes of his travels as a scrap iron salesman.
There isn’’t a weak link in the acting performances or the production elements. For fans of poignant family comedy in general—and Neil Simon’s lively writing in particular—this production is not to be missed.
WHEN: May 17-June 2, 2024
WHERE: RTC, 518 W. Arapaho Road, Richardson TX
WEB: http://www.richardsontheatrecentre.net/
