‘Bright Ideas’ and dark comedy at playhouse

TOM TITUS

Shakespearean tragedy and black comedy have been pretty much mutually

exclusive terms in the theater -- until, that is, playwright Eric

Coble came up with his

“Bright Ideas.”

In the West Coast premiere of Scotland-born Coble’s imaginatively

outrageous play, the setting is the here and now, but overtures of

what theater practitioners euphemistically call “the Scottish play”

(you can’t say “Macbeth” in a theater unless you’re actually

performing “Macbeth”) insinuate themselves throughout the action --

beginning as the first act lights come up on three witches at a

kettle.

The stakes here, however, aren’t national dominance but something

Coble sees as just as vital -- parents getting their 3-year-old

enrolled in the best of all possible nursery schools. To this end,

they’ll go to any lengths, up to and including those practiced by the

Macbeths.

In director Andrew Barnicle’s hilariously macabre production, a

suburban couple (Pat Caldwell and Bo Foxworth) are determined to get

their toddler into the

Bright Ideas pre-school, even if they have to knock off the mother

of another kid to effect a vacancy. That unseen youngster, by the

way, is named Duncan,

which should register with fans of the Scottish tragedy (her own

son’s name is Mac).

Caldwell turns in a savagely brilliant performance, once her

character buys into the task she must perform to achieve her goal.

When the blood (or in this case,

pasta) is on her hands, she’s transformed into a raging harridan

who arrives at her son’s birthday party packing heat. Caldwell

illustrates a superb example of a suburban mother gone totally wacko.

Foxworth, initially a willing co-conspirator, undergoes a change

of his own in the second act. Unable to come to grips with his

conscience, he hits the bottle with a resounding thud, greasing the

slide toward his descent into madness.

There are 16 other characters in the play, all delivered by three

performers. April Ortiz is particularly effective as the divorced mom

invited to a lethal dinner and later doing an airborne Banquo’s ghost

above the birthday party from hell.

Larry Raben excels as, among other things, a competitive father, a

prissy airline steward and a party entertainer in a beaver costume.

Maura Vincent enriches the show in a plethora of other guises,

including a pregnant woman who performs a cartwheel on her curtain

call.

Dwight Richard Odle’s utilitarian setting offers scenic designs

popping out and back from five different curtained areas. Paulie

Jenkins’ challenging lighting assignment is beautifully accomplished

and Julie Keen’s costumes hit the proper note of suburbia.

The key to the success of “Bright Ideas” is pacing -- and director

Barnicle has this element well in hand. A few parents with overt

ambitions for their children may recognize themselves in this show,

but let’s hope not.