Date: Fri 24-Jan-1997

Publication: Bee

Author: SUEZ

Illustration: C

Location: A10

Quick Words:

Gin-Game-theatre-TheatreWorks

Full Text:

(rev "The Gin Game" @TheatreWorks, 1/24/97)

Theatre Review-

TheatreWorks' Latest Is Full Of Fire

(with photo)

By Julie Stern

NEW MILFORD - D.L. Coburn's The Gin Game is a two-character play which won the

Tony and Pulitzer Prizes back in the Seventies when Jessica Tandy and Hume

Cronyn performed it on Broadway. Now TheaterWorks New Milford is taking a

pretty good shot at it with two lesser known but quite competent actors - Elie

Finkelstein and Marty Fay.

A pair of lonely senior citizens, each relegated by physical impairments and

lack of family support to a dreary nursing home existence, Fonsia Dorsey

(Finklestein) and Weller Martin (Fay) use the opportunity of an ongoing gin

rummy game to forge a tentative relationship and re-examine their own prickly

identities, which have not been completely obliterated by the constant small

humiliations of a "home."

Craig Tichy's wonderfully seedy set captures all the shabbiness of an

institution whose relentlessly cheerful and totally patronizing manner merely

emphasizes the fact that whatever they once were, its inmates are absolutely

unimportant.

The plot of the 80-minute comedy-drama is slight. Two residents, whose mental

alertness allows them to share a common humorous contempt for the place, begin

a regular card game as a way of passing empty time. Weller, a former

advertising executive, is teaching Fonsia, the former manager of an apartment

complex, how to play.

Much of the humor revolves around the consistency with which she triumphs -

"Gin!" (slap the cards down) "Gin!" (slap the cards down), and so forth is the

rhythmic motif. No matter what he does, Weller cannot win a game to save

himself.

But the running joke becomes a catalyst for challenging the comforting

pretenses behind which each of them is hiding. Weller's anger over his

repeated losses leads him to strike out at Fonsia's carefully constructed

persona of modest and sweet-tempered humility. In return, goaded to anger

herself, she cuts through his posture of lofty cynicism to uncover a core of

fear and loneliness as great as her own.

There are laughs, but this is not a happy play. There are no solutions offered

to the problem of being deemed superfluous in a culture of boomers. However,

under Susan Lang's very competent direction, the problem is clearly and

eloquently presented, and therefore has something to say to all of us. It is

up to us to create our own answers.

Elie Finkelstein is wonderful in the part of Fonsia, especially in her ability

to capture the physical mannerisms of old age, while at the same time making

clear that while there may be snow on the roof there is plenty of fire in the

furnace.

As Weller, Marty Fay is perhaps a bit less successful, only in that his

youthful voice doesn't seem old enough. However, he is very convincing as an

angry man who finds himself in an extremely frustrating environment.

Finkelstein and Fay will continue to entertain audiences with The Gin Game

through February 8. Performances are weekends; tickets are $12 (adults) or $10

(seniors, students). Call the theatre, 860/350-6863, for details.