Date: Fri 06-Dec-1996

Publication: Bee

Author: SHANNO

Illustration: C

Location: A14

Quick Words:

Spinning-Randazzo-Christmas

Full Text:

(rev "A Classic Christmas" @Spinning Wheel Inn, 12/6/96)

Theatre Review-

A Well-Spun Tale Of A Classic Christmas At The Spinning Wheel

BY SHANNON HICKS

REDDING - Bob Butler is a very trusting man when it comes to the holiday show

at the Spinning Wheel Inn. Mr Butler, the owner of the inn, leaves the annual

holiday musical's production entirely in the hands of Karen Randazzo, who

writes and directs the performances (and usually performs in them as well).

This year the Spinning Wheel is presenting a show called A Classic Christmas ,

and once again Mr Butler has trusted the right people to come through for him.

On November 22, opening night of this year's holiday dinner theatre, Mr Butler

had not seen any of the rehearsals leading up to the show's first performance,

preferring, he said, to see only the finished product. The production would be

as much of a surprise to him as it was to the rest of the guests at the

historic Redding inn.

Mrs Randazzo, who is married to Peter Randazzo (the musical director of this

year's show, and also a player in the cast), has scripted a show with shades

of Dickens' A Christmas Carol and the classic Jimmy Stewart holiday film It's

A Wonderful Life (which itself has shades of the Dickens tale of

what-would-happen-if...), with a little bit of Disney's The Parent Trap thrown

in for good measure.

A holiday show jam packed with drama, comedy and singing, Mrs Randazzo's

presentation is like the meal served course-by-course during each of the

show's intermissions: It leaves nothing out, and is fully satisfying.

A Christmas Classic is Mrs Randazzo's tale of the hardships which have

befallen Quinn's Tavern (Est 1896). Jack Quinn is the proprietor of his

namesake, which has certainly seen better times. His daughter Clara (whose

twin, Tara, has run off to Paris years earlier following a

never-fully-explained fight between father and daughter) is working as a

barmaid at the tavern, where their best customers are Clara, a homeless woman,

and Bobby, a hometown cop who has been a friend of the family since he was old

enough to pick up a billy stick.

Fred Meaney, Jr fits his name. It is Mr Meaney who is giving the Quinn family

its tough ultimatum: Pay up on your past-due rent and overdue bills or I take

the mortgage and kick you out. Mr Meaney sure is a meaney, even going so far

as to threaten to close the neighborhood tavern on Christmas Eve.

On top of all this, a piano player comes into the tavern looking for a job

just after Mr Meaney slaps Jack Quinn with the threat of foreclosure, and Jack

Quinn suffers a heart attack. It isn't looking like a holly jolly Christmas

for the Quinn family this year.

A Classic Christmas is staged with a cast of six. With two shows a day through

the holiday season, two to three actors have been cast for each role, which

will help prevent burnout by any of the cast members.

Paul Hatrick and Scott Kealey are manning the taps as Jack Quinn; Beth Bria

and Barbara Brown handle the dual roles of Tess and Tara Quinn; and Clara is

portrayed by Tracey Marble or Karol Solomon.

Bobby, the neighborhood cop, is one of the three-actor roles, divided between

Bob Bria, John Lamendola and Lou Ursone. The pianist, Mike Miller, who has

about three spoken lines through the course of the play but provides most of

the music laced throughout, is shared by Dave Berliner and Jerold Goldstein.

And Mr Meaney, the Grinch/Scrooge of this year's Spinning Wheel offering, is

shared by Raymond Michaud, Mark Holleran and musical director Peter Randazzo.

With the ending of A Classic Christmas as traditional as the holiday dinner

theatre itself - a segue from the final scene into a roomwide singalong, with

the actors mingling among the dinner guests making a point to wish most of the

patrons a happy holiday season - the performance leading to the finale is also

as enjoyable as ever.