Theater Review—

Town Players Have Created A Very Enjoyable ‘London Suite’

By Julie Stern

When television comedy really got started after World War II,  the young Neil Simon got in on the ground floor, writing for the likes of Milton Berle and Sid Caesar.

That background is clearly apparent in a vehicle like London Suite, now being given a workmanlike production at Newtown’s Little Theater.

Like Plaza Suite before it, and its successor California Suite, the play makes use of a single hotel room as the common link that ties together four different stories. In this case, two of them — both directed by Suzanne Kinnear — are basically comic skits, employing a single running gag.

The other two, directed by Mary Poile, have some clever lines, but are actually more serious studies in character and relationships.

The hotel suite in question is located at London Airport, where the characters have either just arrived, or are getting ready to leave. The first skit, “Settling Accounts,” has Bart Schofield as Brian, a burnt-out writer with a gun, confronting Billy (Steve Hoose) his long time financial adviser, who has systematically robbed him of everything in his account, just as Billy is about to abscond to Argentina. Revenge is sweet, especially when a writer discovers he still has some imagination left.

In the final skit, “The Man on the Floor,” Steve Yudelson and Danette Riso Illig play Mark and Annie, an American couple who’ve just arrived in London, and can’t find their Wimbledon tickets — perfect seats, six rows back, behind a duke and dutchess (and everyone knows royalty never stands up).

In the course of looking for the tickets, Mark throws his back out, so that he must spend the rest of the skit writhing on the floor while being attended to by Pamela Meister as the hotel manager who needs him to vacate the suite because Kevin Costner wants it, Bart Schofield as an overly empathetic doctor, and Steve Hoose as a bellman who is good at finding lost contact lenses.

The two stories with more actual depth begin with “Going Home” in which Ruth Schofield plays an American widow, regaling her daughter (played by Jessyca Lyons-Tucker) with an account of the date from hell with a neurasthenic Scotsman they met on the airplane coming over. While there are lots of laughs to be mined from Mrs. Semple’s difficult evening with “Dennis,” the real meat of the story lies in the mother-daughter relationship, their underlying love for one another,  and the choices Mrs. Semple faces as she struggles to get on with her life rather than cling to the past.

Then, in “Diana and Sidney” Suzanne Kinnear plays a wildly successful aging movie and television star, about to return to Hollywood, having a reunion with her former husband, who left her in order to come out of the closet, and now lives on Crete with his male lover. Steve Yudelson is Sidney, who has come, reluctantly, to beg for money to cover dreaded medical expenses. Again, while there are some snappily funny one liners, this is a story about love and friendship.

The entire cast and production crew have worked hard on the show, and whatever failings it has are in the material itself. If you are a Neil Simon fan or if you simply like television sitcoms, you should enjoy this play and have a pleasant evening out.

(Regular performances of this production continue on Friday and Saturday evenings at 8 pm. Tickets are $18. Call 270-9144 for reservations and other information.

Newtown Woman’s Club will be sponsoring the performance on Friday, May 18, with tickets priced at $25. Call 426-5283 or 426-2185 for reservations or details about that show.

The Little Theatre, where Town Players offer their productions, is on Orchard Hill Road in Newtown.)