Well-made 'Mistakes'

Lisa Bornstein, Rocky Mountain News

Published August 10, 2007 at midnight

Text size  

• 0 Comments
• Email
• Print

When they step onstage, film actors are frequently savaged for not having the skills to reach the back row.

That's not a problem in The Mistakes Madeline Made, a fine melding of the qualities of film and theater. There's the intimacy of film and the delicate performances of those actors, combined with the immediacy and nonliteral nature of the stage.

Twentysomething Hollywood up- and-comers perform the play by an up-and-comer herself, Elizabeth Meriwether. The playwright reveals intriguing notions, crisp language and original characters, if not quite the vision to pull it all together.

Edna, played by Shannon Woodward (The Riches), is a young woman starting work as one of 15 personal assistants to a wealthy family. She's dry and annoyed, drawing pleasure from nothing and instantly loathing her boss, the cheerily autocratic Beth (Greta Seacat).

She's also suffering from the death of her brother (Zach Shields, not given enough background in the script), a journalist traumatized by his experiences in Iraq. His reaction - and hers - is to stop bathing.

It's a fascinating idea, one that's barely explored in Meriwether's script. What's Edna's intention in not bathing? Is she rebelling against the world, or trying to keep parts of herself from sloughing off in the shower?

Woodward has an affinity for the dark, nearly deadened role of Edna, lightening her up with flashes of wit. Her performance is full of nuance but is occasionally so subtle that it's hard to hear her from just a few feet away.

As Beth, Seacat is a marvel: simplistic (she frequently shuts her laptop to avoid news of Iraq) and authoritarian, but awkwardly kind as well. Beth is annoying, but she knows it; in Seacat's hands, she's funny and real.

Justin Chatwin, the older son in War of the Worlds, also gives a distinctive performance as Wilson, a co-worker whose oddness approaches the creepy as he makes Tourette's-like mechanical noises. Chatwin manages the balance well, never becoming too darling or too pathetic.

Johnny Lewis is saddled with three roles, the only cartoons of the script, as a series of writers whom Edna beds. The first two are ludicrous sketches, the only untrue characters in the script and the only ones not given a delicate treatment by director Jamie Wollrab.

But Wollrab finds a consistent tone throughout the piece, dancing between the comic and the touching, with staging that nicely delineates time, space and relationships. It makes for a fresh, current piece of theater.

bornsteinl@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5101

Featured

• 2008 Voter’s Guide

  

  Use our Ballot Builder tool to compare your viewpoints to the candidates.

• A Dozen on Denver

  

  Manuel Ramos' story is featured this week on 'A Dozen on Denver.' Check it out!

• Rocky Multimedia

  

  The news comes alive in our videos and slide shows. Catch up on today's events.

• Bronco Dean's rant

  

  Listen to Bronco Dean's totally biased pregame rant about the Broncos-Jaguars game.

• Presidential Elections

  

  See how Colorado counties have voted through the years.

• County election profiles

  

  A look at how residents in each Colorado county may vote.

• A dream fulfilled

  

  A Rocky Mountain News and MediaStorm production

• Latest from Dove Valley

  

  Click for more broncos videos.

• Sam Adams' Open Mic

  

  No. 44 means a lot to Floyd Little