Sister acts

>> Dolores and Rosemary with Ginger spell strong debut for Tightrope Theatre

by AMY BARRATT

"How many more fucked up guys are you gonna marry?"

That's the question that Sandra (Edith Tankus) poses when sister Dolores (Melina Nacos) arrives on her doorstep with a black eye, fleeing an abusive spouse. The women in Dolores and Rosemary with Ginger, two one-acts by Edward Allan Baker, aren't bleeding hearts.

I went to see the fledgling Tightrope Theatre's production of the two plays, which they are presenting under the title Women on the Verge, for several reasons. Acting coach-turned-director Jacqueline McClintock, a devotee of the Meisner technique, made an instant splash on the theatre scene last year with her production of The Glass Menagerie with another little company, arbat. I was also curious to see whether playwright Baker was really, as advertised in the press release, like "Mamet for women" or whether it would in fact be painfully obvious that I was watching a man's version of what women are like.

As it turns out, Baker has a really firm handle on a certain kind of working class woman. As for the Mamet connection, there is quick, raunchy dialogue and black humour. One of the plays also features a kind of mind game that is somewhat reminiscent of the author of Glengarry Glen Ross.

It's easy to see why Tightrope chose to play these two one-acts together: both feature duos of actresses playing sisters. In both cases, it is the elder who is the major fuck-up. Dolores, as noted, is addicted to abusive guys, and Rosemary (Deanne Bogdanovich) can't lay off the booze. The younger sisters in both cases are apparently more stable, though when you scratch the surface of their settled-down-raising-kids lifestyles, it turns out they too are hanging by a thread. Midway through Rosemary with Ginger, the playwright seemed to be going in a direction that was all too similar to what I'd just seen in Dolores. Happily, the plot took an unexpected twist.

I liked all of the actors in Women on the Verge, who manage to bring out the humour of the writing without ever seeming to go for the laugh.

Given the tiny Balustrade space at the Monument-National and an equally shrimpy budget, set designer Carina Rose has done an excellent job of creating two distinct sets (a 20-minute intermission allows for a set change between the plays). Rose has also concocted costumes which tell volumes about the characters before they ever open their mouths.

Rosemary with Ginger takes place inside the defunct Peter Pan Diner, until recently run by Ginger (Susan Sheridan). The contrast of that name and the general squalor of the characters' lives is almost overkill, but it works. With Baker's characters, it's not that they don't want to grow up, but that they can't escape their horrific childhoods. In Dolores, the handful of stuffed animals strewn about the kitchen floor didn't convince me that actual children had been playing there a short time before (here are some suggestions for a more authentic mess: a ripped crayon box, broken crayons, one running shoe, a couple of socks--not matching, a bunch of paper napkins, a naked doll, a bottle of bubble stuff with bubble pipe, an aluminum pie plate, two plastic dinosaurs). :

Women on the Verge, Wed-Sat until May 27, 8:30pm at the Balustrade, Monument-National. Tickets $15, 871-2224