Censorship, psychoanalysis, and dysfunctional families all have been at the biting pen's end of Christopher Durang's satirical works. His genius lies in his ability to make us squirm, feel the pain, and yet laugh at the kooky protagonists of his plays ~ or, in his own words, to marry absurdist comedy to real feelings. Would that Theatre Artists Studio's production of Baby with the Bathwater measured up to the challenge!
Steel Magnolias is at heart a play about beauty, not the cosmetic kind that stylists manufacture with gels and lotions and sprays but the kind that tells in the truth lines on a woman's face, in the soul that she bares in private and safe moments with friends. The telling of the tale requires skilled and authentic performances by actresses that can reveal the shades and textures of joy and pain and faith and the will to endure no matter what hand life deals. In Stagebrush Theatre's current production of Robert Harling's play, directed by Judy Rollings, six remarkable actresses grace the stage and deliver the goods.
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