SPEAK NO EVIL
A Review of the Springfield Theatre Centre's
Production of
Larry Shue's Comedy, The Foreigner
by James L. Seay

Larry Shue doubtlessly died too soon. With an existing canon of only four plays, his comic genius is only hinted at. He needed more time to grow, but, unfortunately, he was not allowed it. His fascination with the musicality of language, the comedy of missed connections and the frustration of people not being able to communicate by not understanding echoes through all of his existing works, and, mingled with what seems to be a hellzapopping hilarity of near slapstick comedy, his existing work has become well-loved by community theatres across the nation.

The Springfield Theatre Centre's production of Shue's The Foreigner, currently playing at the Hoogland Center for the Arts' Theatre Three and directed by Patrick O'Brien, might best be described as "Erskine Caldwell meets Hee-Haw." Set in a sort of bed and breakfast in the red hills of Georgia, the story deals with a painfully shy Casper Milktoast of a man, Charlie Baker (Rick Dunham) who is brought there for a brief holiday while his wife is hospitalized by his buddy, "Froggy" LeSeure (Kevin Burke), a British army sergeant. Exactly why a playwright from Terre Haute, Indiana wrote these two characters as English, I was never quite able to figure out. Their nationality never seemed to advance the plot, and, in fact, gave the actors, whomever they are, the added chore of speaking with a believable British accent - Charlie, a former officer, with a somewhat upper crust one and Sergeant Froggy with a Cockney one. This may well be because Shue was still growing as a playwright at the time The Foreigner was written.

At any rate, Sgt. Froggy is a buddy of Betty Meeks (Pat Pennington), a sort of uninformed Aunt Bea, who runs the B&B, although the details of their friendship are not clearly brought out in the rather slow first act exposition. The balance of the characters seem to fall right out of Tobacco Road with a slight trace of the old television show, Hee-Haw (or maybe a bit of Al Capp's Li'l Abner) tossed in for spice. Charlie, a painfully timid man who is intimidated by strangers, cannot make conversation - indeed, he is terrified by just the thought of making conversation - so Froggy passes him off as a "foreigner," who neither speaks nor understands the English language. And this becomes the main conflict and thrust of the plot, such as it is. The Caldwelian characters, Catherine Simms (Heather Hubbs) and her mentally challenged brother, Ellard (Jonah Walker) find Charlie to be a fascination in the rather hillbilly world or rural Georgia, strongly resembling Tobacco Road or God's Little Acre. They are opposed by a stereotypic evil preacher David Marshall Lee (Eric Woods) and Good Ol' Boy Owen Musser (Larry Smith).

As is the case in all of Shue's plays, there is an underlying moral in the conflict, but the main thrust is the almost absurdist comedy. The Foreigner is made enjoyable by the situations surrounding Charlie's seeming inability to understand English while the audience knows he understands every word. It is something akin to the notion of people speaking freely in the company of dogs or cats, but what makes it funny is that the dogs and/or cats understand their every word.

Doubtlessly the finest performance of the evening is by Dunham who is at his best either when he is mute or when he is speaking some sort of gibberish, standing in for his "native" tongue. His facial expressions while Owen is getting in his face are hilarious and speak much more than the dialogue ever does. His Chaplinesque mirror image pantomime with Ellard while they are eating breakfast is worth the cost of admission alone. The first scene of the second act is devoted almost in its entirety to poor Ellard trying to teach English to Charlie and is, again, a stand-alone reason for going to the show.

While Dunham does most of the heavy lifting, he is not the only actor in the show. Walker's Ellard is constantly funny, as he again falls right off the pages of an Erskine Caldwell novel as the others around him decide he must be a genius as he is teaching Charlie to communicate, at least partially, in English in just two days. Hubbs, a strikingly pretty blonde, seems to fall not so much out of a Caldwell novel, but from the old Hee-Haw episodes. She is a bit difficult to understand at times due to the exaggeration of her accent - but never once drops out of it and is constantly fun. Of the Heavies, I particularly liked Smith's Owen. He is physically perfect for the part and has the Good Ol' Boy white supremacist character down to the hilt. His scene where he is in Charlie's face insulting him, his background and his family (added to, of course, by Dunham's rubber face) is not only comic, but definitely builds the character of Owen. Pennington's Betty is a somewhat addled Aunt Bea from the old Andy Griffith Show and she carries this part quite well. Burke's Froggy, on the other hand, seemed to be struggling with his Cockney accent. The best line of the show came during a Ku Klux Klan raid on Betty's B&B, as Charlie rips the hood off one of the Klansmen and proclaims "He is a sheet head!"

The productions' biggest problem came from its staging. Director O'Brian chose to stage the play with a Jacobean thrust stage, set on the floor of the auditorium. There is nothing wrong with this concept except that the audience is on the same level and consequently, have to see around those in front of them to see all the action. If the Hoogland's Theatre Three had raked seating on three sides, as does the Station Theatre in Urbana or the Studio Theatre in the Krannert Center on the U. of I. Urbana/Champaign campus, or the Heartland Theatre in Normal, this would not be a problem. In the Hoogland Theatre Three, it is. The same thing was true with the earlier production of The Laramie Project in Theatre Three. This sort of staging just does not work there - particularly if there is a large audience. I was one of the few seated in the wing seating during this production, and did notice that most of the blocking was focused to the center section of the theatre which left those of us seated in the wing sections looking at too many actor's backs. Also, since we were on the same level as the action, actors often blocked other actors. I wish the show had been staged on Theatre Three's delightfully ornate proscenium stage.

But it is almost impossible not to enjoy a Larry Shue play when the main character is (as is the case with this production) played by a consummate character actor. Within the last three seasons, the Springfield Theatre Centre has staged 50% of the Shue canon. I certainly wish they would now produce my favorite of his works, Wenceslas Square. Well, maybe next season?

The Foreigner will be produced tonight and tomorrow as well as next Friday, Saturday and Sunday at Theatre Three in Springfield's Hoogland Center for the Arts, just south of Capital Avenue at 420 South Sixth Street in Springfield, Illinois. Performance times are 8:00 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays with a 2:00 p.m. matinee on Sundays. For reservations, call (217) 523-2787 and take my advice, ask for a seat several rows up in the "risers."