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- Subscribe - Contact Us - Rate Card - Place an Ad Valley&State Backpage O&E Sports Archives Classifieds Faith&Beliefs Obituaries Revels September 7, 2004 'Sisters Rosensweig' a success for Camelot By Roberta Kent Tidings Reviewer Like the swashbuckling Scarlet Pimpernel, oblique references to whom weave through this comedy, the sisters Rosensweig are masters of disguise, experts at hidden identity. Camelot Theatre Company's newest offering is Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein's "The Sisters Rosensweig." The play was nominated for a Tony award in 1993. Camelot's Managing Artistic Director Livia Genise directed this production. "The Sisters Rosensweig" is a play that seems to have been written for comfortable, middle-age Jewish ladies who patronize Broadway show matinees. But it does have universal truths hidden under all those ethnic references - how we all yearn, in some way, to re-invent ourselves. And that we all need at times to let go, be open to life, love and the sometimes uncomfortable. Camelot Theatre Company has done this production proud. Livia Genise does a fine job of keeping the action ebullient and fast-paced with the help of her excellent, thoroughly professional cast. The crisply tailored, opulent set is the work of Nicholas Walsch and is set off ably by Travis Goodman's lighting design and Peter Spring's sound design - with the great added touches of Frank Sinatra. Brian Freese aids the evening's intricate and apt timing as Stage Manager. Set in a comfortable London townhouse in 1991, this gentle and funny play is about three "nice Jewish girls from Brooklyn" who have worked hard to cover over who they are and what they've left behind and replace it for who they yearn to be. In the course of the play, liberally sprinkled with sprightly sitcom-type one-liners, we see each of the women come to terms with herself and her life. Each, in her way, leaves the illusion of safety for honesty and commitment. The three sisters have come together to celebrate the 54th birthday of Sara (Gwen Overland), the eldest. Sara is a successful British banker, the European director for the Hong Kong/Shanghai Bank. She is divorced from her second husband (who, we learn, is now on his fifth wife). A lover of all things British, Sara moved to England, she claims, "to escape American class warfare" and in the process has become a bit of a snob herself, even dating an insufferable, stereotypical British crypto-Nazi, Nick (Scott Honeywell). Sara has a 17-year-old daughter, Tess (Tai Sammons), who is passionately and inexplicably committed to the cause of Lithuanian freedom as well as to a lower-class boyfriend, Tom (Travis Goodman). The second sister, dubbed Gorgeous (Diana Warner) by their dad, seems to have it all. She lives in Boston, is married to a prosperous attorney, has three kids and her own call-in self-help radio talk show. Gorgeous is the sister most tied to her Jewish roots, outrageous in her absurd narcissism. But like her fake Vuitton bag and knock-off Chanel shoes, there is something not quite genuine about Gorgeous. The youngest sister, Pfeni (Laura Derocher), is a successful travel writer, wandering around the globe, having traded authoring commentaries on oppressed women for directions to good restaurants. She is involved with Geoffrey (David Gabriel), a charming, glamorous - and bisexual - British theater director, who is immensely fond of all the sisters Rosensweig. If Sara has been burned by relationships and Gorgeous seems to have it all, Pfeni has simply avoided the commitment question entirely. (Or, as Gorgeous puts it, "I know you can't judge a book by its cover but, my dear, you are in the wrong library.") Into this mix bounces Merv (Bruce Lorange), a frankly Jewish, perceptive and no-nonsense furrier from New York. Merv had saved one of Geoffrey's productions by supplying some last minute costume accessories and a bit of cash. Geoffrey, thinking that Merv might just be Sara's cup of tea, invites him to the birthday bash. Merv's immediate attraction to Sara, compassion for Gorgeous and curiosity about Pfeni - and his wry comments on the trio - set Wasserstein's play into action. An aside: there is one jarring note in this play. For all its references to current events and world turmoil, one obvious element of the sisters' lives lies there like the proverbial, never-spoken-about elephant in the middle of the living room. It is deliberately ambiguous through the play whether Pfeni and Geoffrey's relationship is sexual but there are ample reasons to believe it is. No one, absolutely no one in this play alludes to the fact that by dating a bi-sexual man with an extensive sexual past, Pfeni is playing Russian roulette with AIDS infection. Not even when Geoffrey admits that he started a relationship with a woman because he was terrified of relationships with men, with, as he says, "friends dying all around me," do either of them mention the unmentionable. Perhaps Wasserstein couldn't think of a cute, zingy one-liner that would make it all better? "The Sisters Rosensweig" plays at Camelot through October 3. Note that Priscilla Quinby plays Sara September 8 through 12 and Rebecca Campbell steps in for Laura Derocher September 30 through October 2. Jack Sebold takes over for Scott Honeywell September 30 through October 3. All Thursday, Friday and Saturday performances are at 8 p.m., with Sunday matinees at 2 p.m. There will be an additional matinee performance on Saturday, Oct. 2, at 2 p.m. As usual, Camelot Theatre Company will have a special "pay-what-you-can" performance, on Wednesday at 8 p.m. Tickets are $15, $12 for previews and $13 for students and seniors. Tickets are available at the Theatre box office at the corner of Talent Avenue and Main Street in Talent, on Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Monday from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. or one hour before performances, and from Jeanne Louise Vintage Clothing and Costumes at 296 E. Main St. in Ashland and at Grocery Outlet in Medford. For more information, call 535-5250. 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