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Orange Lemon Egg Canary
By Rinne Groff
Directed by Mikhael Tara Garver
Produced by Uma Productions
At Chopin Studio Theatre
1543 W. Division
Chicago, IL
Call 773-347-1375, tickets $15 Thursdays & Sundays, $20 Fridays & Saturdays
Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays at 7:30 pm
Sundays at 3 pm
Special Saturday 3 pm matinee on May 12
Running time 105 minutes with intermission
Through May 18, 2007
Magic barely enough to carry lame script
Uma Productions has mounted several terrific plays over the last few years. With Orange Lemon Egg Canary they want to do a special show featuring magic. They partly succeeded. Rinne Groff’s unique if not all too coherent script is a magic show-within-a-play with lots of cheap tricks, smoke and mirrors and sensual encounters with some card tricks thrown in.
While I thought the drama has some mystery, it falls flat and plays as a muddled story about a renegade magician, Great (Dennis Watkins) whose sexy new assistant, Trilby (Laura Hooper) pursues him about his past as she finagles the secrets of his special trick—the dangerous and thrilling “chick-on-a-stick. Great is a cold and bland fellow and his former assistant, Egypt (Stephanie Jacobs) and the ghost of his grandfather’s assistant, Henrietta (Anne Adams) conspire to thwart Great’s thunder.
The show plods along with a mixture of unremarkable magic tricks with some sexy scenes while the plot chugs along. The act two magic is amazing and well executed and Laura Hooper and Dennis Watkins deliver nice work. I wasn’t crazy about Groff’s plot twists. I did like the disappearing coins, floating objects and the woman on a stick illusion. The magic saved a mediocre script. Magic fans will like this show.
Somewhat Recommended
Tom Williams
Tom99@chicagocritic.com for comments
Talk Theatre in Chicago podcast
Date Reviewed: April 19, 2007
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