BWW Reviews: Women Wear the Pants in Baltimore Theatre Project's ACT A LADY

Questions of art, gender and cross-dressing run rampant through "Act a Lady," a thought-provoking comedy now at the Baltimore Theatre Project.

The final show of the Iron Crow Theatre Company's 2012-13 season, "Act a Lady," written by Jordan Harrison and directed by Juanita Rockwell, focuses on six members of a Prohibition-era Midwestern town aiming to put on an 18th century "fancy dress" play to raise money for charity.

But it's not the women who don the elegant gowns and parade around in homemade paste jewels.

It's the men.

Miles (Steven J. Satta-Fleming), True (Steve Sawicki) and Casper (Alec Weinberg), are challenged by their fearless, pants-wearing, European director, Zina (Julie Herber) to find their inner lady.

Rounding out the cast is Lorna (Caitlyn Joy), former makeup artist to Hollywood starlets, who pretties the men up for the show's debut, and Miles' wife, Dorothy (Gina Braden), who plays the accordion while struggling to see the "art" in men wearing her delicates.

Perhaps it's because I'm a sucker for a period piece, but the absolute highlight of "Act a Lady" was seeing the men strut the stage in their gorgeous costumes (courtesy of fabric genius Julie Heneghan). Transformed into beautiful aristocrats Lady Romola and the Countess, and the servant girl, Greta, Miles', True's and Casper's male personae melt away, leaving just three hairy "women" on stage.

Sawicki, whose character, True, is probably the town's most manly man, absolutely shines as the scheming Countess, eager to steal the handsome prince from her best friend, Lady Romola. Though his makeup and wig make him look like a member of an 80s hair band, Sawicki portrays a convincing woman, full of sugar one moment and backstabbing venom the next.

True's best friend, Miles, is the perfect foil both offstage and onstage as Lady Romola. The more intelligent of the pair, Satta-Flemming brings a sense of responsibility and duty to the character, creating a man who wants to do right by everyone, no matter how impossible.

Timid and gender-curious Casper is thrilled to sport a dress, even if he "only" plays the servant, Greta. Weinberg portrays the budding photographer as wide-eyed and innocent, yet manages to create his antithesis in saucy (and conniving) Greta. The second a wig of brown curls touches his head, Casper is completely gone.

In a show about acting like a "lady," the most notable performances came from these men. Dressed to the nines in well-fitting drag, they stole the spotlight from their female counterparts, who, in spite of having Shakespearian-sized women's roles, still played excellent supporting characters.

The innumerable monologues-moments of pure exposition-unnecessarily slowed the show's pace and only served as a distraction from the main story. I felt I learned more about the characters from the inner examinations with their alter-egos, like when young Casper talks with his character, Greta, about how unsure he is around women-and it's not because he's too flummoxed by beauty to speak.

Weinberg reveals his extensive range as a young actor in a quiet scene where Casper, speaking in Greta's voice, puffs powder onto his nose. As he gazed into Lorna's makeup mirror, I felt tears well up in my eyes. Here was a man-still a boy, really-struggling to know who he was in a town that might never accept him.

And that's a story that resonates across the globe.

The first live performance of any show has a special set of kinks that no number of rehearsals can erase, and the opening night of "Act a Lady" was no different.

As is common with black box theaters, it was sometimes difficult to hear the actors, and I was sitting in the third row. Unfortunately, that wasn't the only sound problem. The actors' were sometimes so focused on perfecting their Midwestern accents that I couldn't understand what they were saying. I even missed out on dialogue when they didn't allow a pause for the audience's rambunctious laughter after several of the show's many jokes-it is a comedy after all.

And in one scene, the actors actually perform their lines away from the audience. While I understand the purpose-the group was performing a rehearsal of the play within the play-that didn't help my hearing.

Despite this strange blocking and those confusing accents, at least I could hear Dorothy sing while she played the accordion, the only show's only musical accompaniment. And that is one loud instrument.

A few additional technical difficulties-a harsh tug to free a snagged backdrop caught on its line and a small kerfuffle with the unfamiliar padding of "fancy dress"-ended up becoming humorous additions, rather than obvious mistakes.

At the end of the short, two-hour play, I walked away from the theatre mulling over the same question that Dorothy posed in a speech from the first act: "what really is art?" Can a play with just six actors, a strange blocking and men in full period dress be considered art? Can mistakes be made and yet still produce something of quality-a piece someone could admire?

My answer is a resounding, "yes."

"Act a Lady" continues its run at the Baltimore Theatre Project, 45 West Preston St., now thru June 8. Tickets are $15, and $10 for students, seniors, artists and military. For more information, call 443-637-CROW (2769), or visit ironcrowtheatre.com.

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