Retiring “ladies” chilling in playhouse drama

Tom Titus

Plays like “Arsenic and Old Lace” aside, murders on stage usually

seem particularly shocking when committed by an elderly lady who

otherwise appears the very soul of propriety.

Thus, a vintage chestnut such as “Ladies in Retirement” by Edward

Percy and Reginald Denham continues to spellbind its audiences upon

each periodic revival. Of course, it helps to have a tight,

well-enacted production such as the one currently on view at the

Huntington Beach Playhouse.

This mannered period piece, set in the rural England of 1885, does

take its bloody sweet time getting to the heart of the matter, but

once the murderous wheels are set in motion, director Terri Miller

Schmidt’s skilled cast spins a web of treachery and deceit from which

its characters struggle to extricate themselves. The focal point of

this eerie drama is Ellen Creed, a maiden lady down on her financial

luck who has been taken in as a companion for a wealthy former

showgirl, now approaching her dotage but still quite frisky. Ellen,

however, has two younger, eccentric sisters whom she invites for a

visit and whose demeanor is somewhat unsettling to the mistress of

the house. When ordered to send the sisters away, Ellen faces a

life-altering choice -- and the decision she makes, and its

consequences, are calculated to chill. Particularly after the wild

card in the deck, a scoundrel nephew, enters the picture.

In the Huntington Beach production, veteran actress Teri Ciranna

wraps herself into the role of Ellen with force and determination.

Like a lioness protecting her cubs, Ciranna guards her sisters’

welfare while exerting her dominating force over their lives in an

outstanding performance.

The sisters are a diverse pair. Patricia Rambo enacts the sunny,

spacey Louisa with a fluttery nonchalance while Valerie Speaks

portrays the sour, humorless Emily, a sworn enemy of all things

Catholic, with a grim petulance. Together, they are dual albatrosses

around the neck of the stern yet loving Ellen. Patrick M. Strong

injects a touch of larceny and rakishness into the picture as Albert,

the sisters’ nephew who arrives a fugitive from the law and remains

to hatch an intricate plot of his own with the assistance of the

dull-witted maid (Wendy Felicia Braun), whom Albert holds in thrall

with his romantic overtures.

The lady of the house, whose possessions and station Ellen covets,

is given a blowsy, somewhat overdone treatment by Margaret

VandenBerghe, who nevertheless creates a most memorable character,

even while maddeningly playing and singing songs from “The Mikado,”

which will stay with you like an overcooked dinner. Dawn Conant

completes the cast as a nun from the nearby abbey.

Scenic designer Helen Fearon has created a luxurious, old English

backdrop, realized by set designer James W. Gruessing Jr., which

establishes the 19th century period tone beautifully. The costumes of

Larry Watts and Tom Phillips work exceptionally well, as does Michael

Schrupp’s often-eerie lighting designs.

“Ladies in Retirement” is, like most plays of its genre, somewhat

overextended in its elaborate establishment of its characters and

situations, and its effect might be heightened by some judicious

pruning. Yet the strength of its cast -- particularly the second-act

faceoff between Ciranna and Strong -- prevails to deliver an

appreciable punch.