If
Love American Style was still on TV, then – on a good night - you would see a show very much like
A Night in Vegas. Okay, a gay Love American Style. Night is alternately funny, hilarious, occasionally touching and sometimes wildly off the mark. But, more often than not, it is a lot of fun – and with a 10:30 week-end start time, the show is rightly pitching itself as a fun night out.
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Night is built of several scenes, so there is probably something to amuse and annoy most everyone. The over arching theme is around acceptance, and though usually handled delicately, a few times it is as subtle a sledgehammer.
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The play starts with a simple farce where the pace and coincidences build excellently. Nicholas Pierro and Kelly Riley play long time bored lovers who are unexpectedly confronted with an annoyed rent boy, an opportunistic bell hop, a fainting john and an annoyed security guard in a cheap hotel room. Their hopes for a quiet, if not romantic, holiday are uprooted as the situation swings wildly out of control. Misters Pierro and Riley are two of the standouts in the production, both in this scene and in the final scene. The opening scene reminds one of those impossible Marx Brother’s skits, with excellently timing from all involved.
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The mood shifts in the next scene, in which Jason Romas, abandoned by his friends at a dance club, gets a ride home with Drew Stark. Both actors do a fine job with material that might have ventured into melodrama easily. The emotions are honest enough to easily reach the audience.
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The play wobbles in the 3rd piece, an uncomfortable scene might have been designed only to show that physically disabled people can be assholes too.
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And a funny, and possibly poignant, set up in the 4th scene is seriously hampered by age inappropriate casting. Ali Grieb plays a mother who is supposed to be a good 25 + years older than the actress is. Miss Grieb, gamely trying to capture the character without caricature, is hampered by a bad wig and a sense of restraint; when a better role model might have been Shelly Winters in her over-the-top years. Bill Purdy does a great job playing the father, helped by more age appropriate casting. Mr. Purdy is effective here but given little to do.
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Mr. Purdy is however, rewarded in the fifth and final scene with a much meatier role as semi-sugar daddy to a young man waking from a week-end bender to a room full of new friends and a bad hangover. Scott Lilly plays the young man in question, showing a nice comic timing. He portrays the gangly awkwardness and odd sexuality of blossoming youth well. Simultaneously offended and flattered by the attention. Misters Riley and Pierro show up in this final scene as well, perfectly working as a couple who have enjoyed themselves totally. Like all the best pieces in A Night In Vegas, this works in large part because the actors throw themselves into the world of camp.
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Writer Joe Marshall, who penned this in the late 1990s, directs the action in this turn. It is a fun evening, and, like that silly old sitcom, A Night In Vegas works best when actors let themselves go a little crazy. Casper De la Torre handles the scenic and lighting design with a miniature golf goes gay hotel room décor that was probably more appropriate before Vegas got on the gay money bandwagon big time. In fact, between Mr. Marshall’s direction and Mr. De la Torre’s glitter gun, the entire show has a 1990s, let’s have fun vibe.
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A Night In Vegas is a great reason to go out with friends and laugh before hitting the bars for a serious night of bar hopping. . As for the warning about male nudity, that there is. Not too much, and none too subtle, it is a happy fun kind of nudity. It strikes the right note in the show, rooted in frivolity not sleaze.
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A Night In Vegas
The Bleecker Street Theatre, May 28th - tbd
Cast list: Daniel Bak, Jonathan Craig, Edy Escamilla, Joe Fanelli, Ali Grieb, Denis Hawkins, Scott Lilly, Nicholas Pierro, Gerald Prosser Jr., Bill Purdy, Kelly Riley, Jason Romas, Drew Stark, Chris von Hoffmann
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Rating: Worth the Money
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What works: The farce and the timing
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What doesn't work: The foul mouthed blind guy
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What you get to brag about to your friends: It starts at 10:30 in a theater with a bar, take your friends with you and have a blast.
