By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic (“Steppin’ Out“)
There was a time when Tallulah Bankhead was as well known a celebrity as any who dominate the social media channels of our own time. She was the wild child of her generation, beloved as an icon of stage and screen, who hung out at the Algonquin Hotel and traded witticisms with the likes of Dorothy Parker and Alexander Woollcott.
A proud product of the Deep South, Tallulah’s roots included a grandfather who was a former Speaker of the House and an overbearing father who served as an Alabama Senator. She had an older sister who helped raise her, but she bore the overwhelming guilt of a lifetime knowing her birth contributed greatly to the demise of her mother who died when she was just a mere infant.
“Nobody can be exactly like me,” she was quoted as saying. “Sometimes even I have trouble doing it.”
Tallulah’s antics as a boozer, pill popper and sniffer of all manner of drugs may have been quaint at the time, but would never pass muster now. “Cocaine isn’t addictive,” she once quipped. “I should know. I’ve been using it for years.”
She was such a stage luminary that she starred in the original Broadway cast of Lillian Hellman’s The Little Foxes, grabbed a Tony Award for her leading role in Thornton Wilder’s The Skin of Our Teeth and was reportedly offered the part of Blanche Dubois in A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams himself before it went to Jessica Tandy. (She turned it down, of course.)
As large a celebrity as she was, she was extremely difficult to work with and impossible to manage. That is part of the background for Looped, a two-act play by Matthew Lombardo that expands on a famous Hollywood story regarding the fading actress on her last film.
The last item needed for the final editing of “Die, Die, Darling” was for the actress to loop or sync her voice in a sound studio to match the movement of her mouth on the screen for a single line. What should have taken less than half an hour stretched out for more than eight hours.
Like a fly on the wall, we are witness to the shenanigans of the recording session with Leslie Castay playing the role of the enfant terrible. Castay, a local actress with numerous Broadway credits and several local starring roles, is quite ably directed in this effort by New Orleans’ First Lady of the Stage, Janet Shea.
Castay has herself stewarded several local productions as a director including the Jefferson Performing Arts Society’s production of Young Frankenstein a fortnight ago and the award-winning Irving Berlin’s “Holiday Inn” last year. In this effort, she is able to take on the personality of the Hollywood and Broadway star without having to be concerned about other aspects of the production. In this role as Tallulah she is positively luminescent.
Lombardo’s script is chock-a-block with famous quotations from the star and reflective of the breezy way she went through life without a care. Numerous lines describe her escapades in the bedroom, never caring with whom she slept or what sex they were. She has the countenance of an angel, but curses like a sailor.
Eric Lincoln plays Danny Miller, a studio film editor assigned to make the one-line loop happen and finish the film. But the truth is that Tallulah can detect that he is holding back, holding onto some terrible secret that is eating him up.
David L. Haydel, Jr. serves as the recording engineer Steve, who is seen suspended in the back of the stage behind a recording studio window.
While Haydel’s role is a literal bit of window dressing, Lincoln’s part is much more critical as the tension between the upstart and the studio employee boils over. The funny lines get the audience to what turns out to be a true meeting of the minds about the secrets they are keeping from the outside world.
The sound design by Eric Porter is important and quite good and the lighting by Carole Padazzle is nicely done. Benjamin Dougherty continues to excel at a scenic designer with this impressive set on a small stage. Also, a shout out to Leonard Bertolino who stage managed this production.
Looped (1 hour and 45 minutes with a 10-minute intermission), written by Matthew Lombardo and directed by Janet Shea, continues its run at the Westwego Cultural Center, 166 Sala Avenue in Westwego, LA through Nov. 19. Show times are 7:30 p.m. on Fri. & Sat. and 2:00 p.m. on Sunday. Tickets are available at 504-885-2000 or click here.
