By Marilyn Jozwik
Falls Patio Players opens its 2021-22 season with the delightful comedy “Things My Mother Taught Me” by Katherine Disavino.
The story has so many opportunities for humor and this cast of six doesn’t miss any of them. Karen McKinney directs.
A young couple, Olivia (Zoe Oskarsson) and Gabe (Simon McGhee), are moving from New York into a modest apartment in Chicago, where Gabe is planning to pop the question. The comedy starts when a high-back chair – the first piece of furniture the couple bought together (and the first to go into the apartment) – gets stuck in their apartment’s entry door. This provides an opportunity to meet the building’s “super,” played by Goo, a performer who makes every role memorable. Her well-placed ominous “oh-ohs” and her proclaiming “My English is not so good” in a thick Polish accent always get laughs.
Olivia (Zoe Oskarsson) and Gabe (Simon McGhee) share a tender moment in Falls Patio Players’ “Things My Mother Taught Me.”
The move is starting to get on the couple’s nerves, but the tension accelerates when Gabe’s parents, played by married couple Dottie and Mike Crain, and Olivia’s parents (Diane Kallas and Don Lambert), arrive on the scene to help their children settle in … and plan to stay overnight! The hilarity ramps up with a toilet seat adventure, a stolen moving van, a missing wedding ring, a bottle of Polish booze and some mischief with a whipping cream canister.
I really enjoyed Oskarsson and McGhee as the young couple, as they convey the excitement – and irritations -- of moving in together, their willingness to work things out and their affection toward each other. Oskarsson transitions nicely from starry-eyed girlfriend to willful daughter as her mother lectures her on her lifestyle choices. A veggie chopping scene with Oskarsson and Kallas gives a wonderful comic edge to their annoyance. McGhee is as comfortable as a favorite old sweater as the sweet, laid-back Gabe, but turns charmingly taciturn when his best-laid plans go awry.
Olivia’s parents (Dottie and Mike Crain), left, and Gabe’s parents (Diane Kallas and Don Lambert) peek in on their children in their new apartment in a scene from Falls Patio Players’ “Things My Mother Taught Me.”
As the mothers, Dottie Crain and Kallas settle into their mom-knows-best roles with abandon, adding lots of comic flair. The dads, Mike Crain and Lambert, know best to stay out of the way of their rampaging wives. The dads get their chance to offer Gabe advice and engage in some rowdy male bonding in a tender and funny proposal mishaps scene. “He (Gabe’s dad) may smell like whiskey and pickles, but he speaks the truth,” says Olivia’s dad.
And what can you say about Goo’s character? You simply have to see her arrive on the set and you know something unexpected or hilarious is going to happen. When she brings in a bottle of booze to help the ladies deal with the tension, her Polish toasts become a farcical a word salad.
Playwright Disavino doesn’t dazzle with witty repartee, but manages to create characters and scenarios that are fun to watch in their earnestness and no doubt resonate with young couples and parents everywhere.
If You Go
Who: Falls Patio Players
What: “Things My Mother Taught Me”
When: Through Oct. 3
Where: North Middle School Auditorium, N88 W16750 Garfield Drive, Menomonee Falls
Info/Tickets: www.fallspatioplayers.com