The Review

Our director made us wait to see this review. He was afraid, he said, that people would change their performances. This created in me no small paranoia. What would you change unless you were critiqued harshly? I needn't have worried.

Lapczynski is outstanding. Her Olive is a tough, articulate sports nut who is eventually totally consumed by her dislike for friend Flo’s all-consuming neatnikism. Lapczynski has total command of the stage, not only with her
physical presence, but with her voice and the very attitude she projects as Olive.

I came out unscathed, but I could see why Jeff was holding the review. The Trivial Pursuit gals were dismissed as "unladylike charicatures." That's how Simon wrote them, and though our actresses carry little responsibility for that and the reviewer made no suggestion that they did, we have newcomers to the stage who might have read it that way.

Florence's review was also a maze of wording. Complimentary on the surface, but dizzying upon inspection.

Jo Dempsey is a total Florence. We know, even before she speaks a word, that this woman would drive anybody over the edge within a very short time. She is convincing to a fault.

"Convincing to fault" in this instance would send me scurrying to therapy.

This review was sent via e-mail to our director, who then forwarded it to me. Its format suggested it was posted somewhere online and I scurried to find a link to send to friends and family who supported my visit west and made it possible. I found in the source information something about "TMC Press" and began my search there. I did not find a link to the review. What I found was that our critic, Robert Hitchcox, was a published author. And a cancer survivor.

In 1997, "Hitch" as he calls himself, wrote a short, humor-laced book about living with prostate cancer, available at Amazon.com. In 2005, still going strong, he sat in a small theatre in Chula Vista, watching our show.

Thanks, Hitch, for your kind words. But more than that, thank you for keeping your sense of humor and sticking around to write them.