Village Playhouse delves into ‘beyond therapy’

By Katherine Beeson  

Published Feb. 18, 2020

Playwright Christopher Durang writes very intriguing plays
and unique characters. He’s a bit of an acquired taste, but ultimately draws the audience in and holds their interest until the end. 

This is truly the case with “Beyond Therapy” presented by Village
Playhouse. Directed by Elizabeth M. Havican, the story starts out rather weird but quickly makes you care about the characters and their stories. Havican does a nice job meshing the intensity with the almost-absurd and delivers a solid show.   

Bruce takes out a singles’ ad, Prudence answers and they
meet at a restaurant. It does not go well and each retreats to the offices of their individual therapists. Bruce’s therapist advises him to rewrite the ad and it is once again Prudence who answers. They decide to date each other even though Bruce is bisexual and in a relationship with Bob and Prudence had been sleeping with her therapist. Once we meet the therapists – a lecherous, foul-mouthed Dr. Framingham (an appropriately lustful performance by Derek Jacobs)
and an off-beat Dr. Wallace (a great turn by Maggie Wirth) -- who for some reason is prone to malapropisms and calls her patients “porpoises” until a long word play gets her back on track – the audience is sure that Bruce and Prudence would be better off working through their issues themselves. Bruce’s boyfriend Bob gets in the mix and even the restaurant’s waiter is involved.  

Tom Forshee delivers a sort of sweet, solid Bruce who I
found myself rooting for and Bailey Haag does a very nice job as Prudence as she tries to figure out just what she wants. Jeff McMahon is a perfect petulant-because-I-am-being-replaced Bob and Randall J. Tranowski gives us a wonderful haughty waiter who is not too inclined to actually wait on tables. This cast worked well together.   

The one issue I had was with scene changes. This play takes
place in a restaurant, both therapists’ offices and Bruce’s apartment –
ambitious to say the least. The stage is small and instead of opting for
anchored dual-purpose set pieces with minimal switches to indicate the various places, a complete set change happens with furniture moving and hampers brought on to redecorate. Each change is very long and very noisy, and we go into the next scene with crooked pictures on the wall, things missed from the previous scene or things in the wrong places from the first time the location appeared.
Fortunately, the actors quickly bring the audience back into the story.  

IF YOU GO:  

Who: Village Playhouse

What: “Beyond Therapy”

Where: Inspiration Studios, 1500 South 73rd St., West Allis

When: 7:30 pm Feb. 21 and 22; 2 pm Feb. 23.

Info/Tickets: www.villageplayhouse.org