Review: THE COTTAGE at Wichita Community Theatre

Wichita Community Theatre opens its 2025-2026 season with Sandy Rustin’s side-splitting comedy and recent 2023 Broadway production of THE COTTAGE, under the direction of veteran Mary Lou Phipps-Winfrey. The comedy runs now through September 14, 2025.

THE COTTAGE is a story about marriages, trysts, and romances, and it asks the question of whether marital faithfulness is even necessary to a lasting relationship.  Does wedded bliss even exist, or do these affections change over the years, and could partners be swapped from time to time?  And is love the adhesive that keeps couples together?

This comedy of manners is set in a comfortable English countryside cottage just 90 minutes outside of London in 1923. For seven years, Sylvia (Holland Lee Kiser) and Beau (Jonny Kline) have carried on a Same Time, Next Year type of annual one-night fling at his widowed mother’s quaint country home.  But Sylvia is married to Beau’s brother, Clarke (Mark Schuster), and Beau is cheating on both Sylvia and his very pregnant wife, Marjorie (Jami Thomas), with his mistress, Dierdre (Miranda Windholz).  Although Deidre happens to be married to wildly jealous Richard (Christopher Martin).  Audience members may need a scorecard to keep track of who is sleeping with whom in this British romp as we watch these characters scuffle with the costs of their marital betrayals!  To disclose more about their connections and plot twists would give away too much of the story.  For laughs’ sake, the situation is over the top!

The current WCT production is extraordinary in all aspects.  Directed with her accustomed theatrical skill, Director Phipps-Winfrey, with the assistance of Stage Manager Crystal Meek,  has assembled a stellar cast in this season opener.  The action is staged well, and Phipps-Winfrey guides each actor onstage into nicely rounded characters.  The show’s swift pacing had the audience in stitches and belly laughs throughout the afternoon.

Kiser’s Sylvia is beautiful and strong as we watch her character’s arc moving from a flirty romantic to a level-headed independent woman by the play’s conclusion.  Kline’s comic timing is spot-on, and he really rocks the garter socks.  Watching him scramble for hidden cigarettes is fun.  Schuster plays stuffy-shirt Clarke to a tee and is always an audience favorite. He’s in his moment when we see him trying to hide under his umbrella. Thomas’s portrayal of the quite pregnant wife is …a gas. (You’ll have to see the show to catch that reference!) I thoroughly enjoyed her brilliant performance.  Dressed in a stunning hot pink frock, veteran actress Windholz commands the stage when she is on.  Her facial expressions are priceless. WCT audiences first saw Martin onstage in BOOK OF DAYS, and Wichita audiences are delighted that he’s back.  His performance is both entertaining and hilarious.

A lovely set design by Phipps-Winfrey and Properties Designer Lana Jeppesen features a beautiful vintage living room filled with attractive period furniture, a Victrola, dark wooden doors, and a large wooden trunk, plus all sorts of fun details that the audience sees before the show starts, such as undergarments on the staircase banister and a necktie flung over a statue.   And just wait til you see where Kline’s character has hidden his pants!

Mary Tush Green’s costume design is perfect for the period.  Light design by Tony Applegate is exactly what it should be, and sound design by Dan and Brad Schuster is nicely done.  The biggest compliment needs to go to Intimacy Director Erin Urick, who has made this cast relaxed and comfortable with portraying their affections for each other, especially during the comedic frenzy.   Kudos Erin!   

The biggest downfall for the performance, though, was the audience’s failure to silence their cell phones after being asked to during Phipp-Winfrey’s curtain speech.  Constantly throughout the performance, cell phones ringing disturbed the performance for everyone else.  I look forward to the day when cell phones are banned in the theatre.

Big kudos to Wichita Community Theatre for their new easy-to-use ticketing system and redesigned program.  The program looks the best it’s ever looked!