Beowulf Alley scores big with 'Of Mice and Men' www.tucsoncitizen.com ®:
Published: 05.10.2007
Beowulf Alley scores big with 'Of Mice and Men'
CHUCK GRAHAM
Tucson Citizen
What a season it's been for the Beowulf Alley Theatre Company. After setting a higher standard for local theater last January with the downtown company's atmospheric thriller "The Woman In Black," BATC followed with the well-received special stage effects of "Black Comedy" by Peter Shaffer.
Now we have an even more haunting production in John Steinbeck's Depression-era tale, "Of Mice and Men." Director Glen Coffman draws finely shaded performances from Terry Erbe and Stephen Elton as George and Lennie, a pair of migrant farmworkers in rural California, adrift and deprived of any chance to earn a decent wage doing physical labor. Their determination to be resourceful is a poignant reminder that government cannot be trusted to take care of its people.
Steinbeck was writing about poor families ripped apart in the 1930s when America's economy fell apart. Erbe's portrayal of the rough-mannered but good-hearted George is a compelling portrait of the kind of blue-collar guy we like to think built our country. Hardworking, honest and determined to keep everyone honest.
George's patience with the simple-minded Lennie proves George could have been a good family man. Instead, the misfortunes of this failed economy have turned George into a drifter who makes the man-child Lennie his family.
Elton amplifies the effect by playing on Lennie's almost infantile innocence, completely unaware in his gentleness that he has the physical strength of a giant. George and Lennie, always bickering like a married couple, share a kind of co-dependence in finding reasons to dream beyond their next paycheck working California's struggling farmlands.
The rest of the cast is equally strong, building together like a finely tuned ensemble, adding the story's elements of racism and ageism that ring even louder in our present time of civil rights awareness and of boomers nearing retirement.
grade: A
