Opening
Nights

Cabaret

Village Theatre, 303 Front St. N. (Issaquah), 425-392-2202. $35–$67. Runs Through July 3; 
See villagetheatre.org. for schedule. (moves to Everett July 10–Aug. 2.)

You’d never know it from Liza Minnelli’s performance in the 1972 Bob Fosse film, but Sally Bowles—one of the great female star vehicles in musical theater—is an Englishwoman. Billie Wildrick brings her a very British dash in Village Theatre’s Cabaret, adding hints of Auntie Mame and Eliza Doolittle to her ability to play both flamboyance and anguish and to sell a song—which climaxes just where it should, in her 11 o’clock number, the title tune. Yet the rest of the cast is strong enough never to risk being drowned out. As Cliff, the writer who falls for her, Brian David Earp is impressively solid in a part that gives him little more to do than react to the madness around him. Anne Allgood is powerful, without caricature, as their landlady, Fraulein Schneider, and Peter Crook’s Herr Schultz downplays the threat of the Third Reich heartbreakingly. Matthew Smucker’s decoratively cluttered set is ingenious and eye-filling, and the pit band, under Tim Symons’ direction, is the most stirring I’ve heard at Village Theatre.

All the ingredients are there, but the show nevertheless lacks atmosphere—a sense of gathering doom. For example, take “Tomorrow Belongs to Me,” the peak of sinister genius in composer John Kander’s score, a gemutlich waltz perverted into an ominous anthem of Aryan conquest; as sung by an angelic lad (Matthew Bratton and Jaryn Lasentia share the role), it is—can’t help but be—stomach-turningly creepy. But it comes out of nowhere; it’s an effective theatrical shock, but a jolting one, since it’s the first point in the performance that you’re reminded that, oh yeah, this is Germany in the ’30s.

And as hard as the chorus, led by Jason Collins’ malevolent Emcee, works to bring to life the louche performers of the Kit Kat Club and make splashy fun out of the production numbers, there’s not an atom of eroticism from start to finish—and thus no way for sex and doom to play off each other, which to my mind is pretty much the point of Cabaret. Sure, there are plenty of giggly doppel-entendres in Joe Masteroff’s book, but, as my plus-one remarked as we left, this is a PG-13 show. If you’ve been looking for a Cabaret to which you can take the kids, you’re in luck; you may have to explain a few plot points about racism, prostitution, and abortion, but, trust me, any given Teatro ZinZanni show is considerably randier. Gavin Borchert

PTalley’s Folly

Seattle Public Theater at the Bathhouse, 7312 W. Greenlake Dr. N., 524-1300, 
seattlepublictheater.org. $5–$32. 
7:30 p.m. Thurs.–Sat., 2 p.m. Sun. Ends May 31.

When it comes to all-American 31-year-old “spinster” Sally Talley (Rebecca Olson), 42-year-old Jewish bachelor accountant Matt Friedman (Mike Dooly) has nothing to lose. His family’s already dead. He feels “absurd” wherever he goes (“I’m walking into an unfriendly church in my underwear here”). So he’ll have to pitch a no-hitter of woo at this woman who by every indication loathes everything about him.

Stalker or a romantic? Since the setting for Lanford Wilson’s Pulitzer-winning 1979 dramedy is small-town Missouri in 1944, let’s go with the latter. It’s not hard to make that leap with Matt cooing Yiddish-influenced buttercream endearments. But it’s that same friendly unction that horrifies Sally and her WASP clan. All the action takes place at the Talley family’s boathouse (the eponymous “folly,” here a dilapidated mess of dark, twisty tree trunks, broken shutters, and grandiose columns designed by Craig Wollam). Meanwhile Sally’s uptight family is just up the nearby hill, and she periodically cries out to them for rescue from this relentless suitor.

With Dooly going full-tilt on loopy charm, including crackerjack character imitations, the thwarting falls thanklessly to Olson during the first half of the 97-minute mating dance. Olson’s very good, but Sally’s tight-lipped, cold-eyed blocking gets old fast. Something happened there at the folly the previous year—something that was great for Matt but rotten for her. Self-hating people like Sally instantly lose respect for anyone who likes them, so we share Matt’s frustration with her. But he has no boundaries and can’t take no for an answer, which raises the stalker-or-romantic question (especially when he physically obstructs her escape and stifles her screams with his hand). When Sally’s ice finally starts to melt, it becomes fun to watch her resist her own climate change. But still the flip side of the question lingers: Are we watching love or battle fatigue? (Shana Bestock directs these heartfelt hostilities.)

The play’s wartime context sets up modest expectations. With so many men gone, Sally’s marital prospects are nearly as poor as Matt’s (a Jew in St. Louis, where intermarriage is rare). Life’s not going to be smooth for these disparate two, despite their kindred unconventionality—and a dangerously neat plot turn late in the game. While Matt and Sally natter and divulge, the sallow, ebbing sunlight steals to silvery moonlight, like a sepia photograph in reverse. Although modern women might say guys like Matt are why the restraining order was invented, you can also see why Sally’s heart might undergo a late-inning reversal. Margaret Friedman

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