There's plain old silly and then there's, you know, silly as in being really funny and that's what you'll find with The Book of Liz, Thinking Cap Theater's latest play at the Vanguard.
LEFT: Christine Groom, Elena Maria Garcia. RIGHT: Matt Stabile, Scott Douglas Wilson, Elena Maria Garcia, Christina Groom.
Written by the brother and sister team Amy and David Sedaris, both of whom must have been struck by a silly stick at an early age, The Book of Liz is like an exploding sheep: ssss, boom, baa, and gags fly out in all directions, endlessly.
Sweaty Sister Elizabeth Dunderstock (Christina Groom) is the under appreciated house slave of Reverend Tollhouse (Matt Stabile). She mops the floors and makes the cheese balls in the Squeamish community of Cluster Haven. Brother Brightbee (Scott Douglas Wilson) visits and wants her secret recipe for the traditional and smokey cheese balls. Browbeaten, she gives it up and then, in despair, leaves the quiet, religious community for life in the wide, wicked world. And meets a walking, talking, obscenely gesturing peanut.
Elena Maria Garcia is inside the peanut. She's a Ukrainian refugee with a cockney accent and a wife beater wearing husband (Wilson). They invite Sister Dunderstock to stay with them in their trailer and help her find happiness as a trainee waitress in the Plymouth Crock Restaurant where the employees are dressed as Pilgrims and all are twelve step recovering alcoholics. Stabile is the gay manager.
Back at Cluster Haven things are not well. Despite having the recipe, Brother Brightbee cannot make cheese balls that sell. The community is stoney, wolves at the door, the rumble of unfilled stomachs throughout the land. The Sqeamish are almost finito. Does Sister Dunderstock return? Does she save...
The script is a delight, the jokes are clever and with Mark Duncan's direction the pace never slackens.
Each actor shines. Groom hardly leaves the stage, switching from innocent to devil at the drop of a cheese ball and her Brother Hesikiah routines are little gems. Garcia brings physical comedy to new heights. Her cheese tasting should be in the Cheddar Hall of Fame. Wilson is the master of the look. He does more by just doing nothing; subtlety as an art form. Stabile does not have the flamboyant roles of the others but makes the most of the ridiculously wigged and bearded Reverend Tollhouse and the gay restaurant manager with the pilgrim's floppy hat.
The comic book factual costumes are the work of Casey Dressler and Nicole Stodard. The Peanut was designed by Veronique Cote. Alyiece Moretto designed the set and the lighting was designed by Calypso Hernandez. The wonderfully appropriate scene change music was designed by David Hart using clips from the The Electric Amish Band. Check them out on youtube.
Thinking Cap Theater's The Book of Liz runs through June 28 at theVanguard, 1501 South Andrews Avenue, Ft. Lauderdale. 813-220-1546. www.vanguardarts.org.
