Worcester County Light Opera Company's BLITHE SPIRIT Closes Feb. 14

In this day and age, rife with computer-speak and the semi-literacy of text messaging, Noel Coward's elegant use of words seems like something unearthed from prehistoric times. Fortunately, Worcester County Light Opera Company's handsomely mounted and crisply performed production reminded us during its Friday night premiere just how sonorous the English language can be.  'Blithe Spirit' will play its final performance on February 14, 2010.

Henry Higgins would beam with pride. Those who prefer car chases and CGI explosions to mellifluously enunciated dialogue are advised to look elsewhere, but as suave drawing room comedies go, "Blithe Spirit," which enjoyed a revival on Broadway last year, is music to the ears. Not only that, but Mark Goodney's clever and resourceful direction includes some very impressive how-did-he-do-that special effects at the end of this charming lark.

Charles Condomine (Todd Yard) is a successful novelist turning to the occult for his next book. He's invited a medium, Madame Arcati (Margaret M. Tartaglia), to his home to conduct a seance as part of his research. What Madame Arcati conjures up is the ghost of Charles' first wife, Elvira (Jane Becker), and the complications that ensue from this unexpected faux pas spiral outward in delightfully catty ways.

Only Charles can see and hear Elvira, causing his disbelieving current wife, Ruth (Lydian DeVere), to think he's directing his admonishments to her instead of Elvira, who revels in the deliberate consternation she's creating. That is, until Elvira proves to Ruth that Charles is telling the truth by carrying a vase around the living room.

To this point, "Blithe Spirit" feels like a hyper-extended setup, and it may require some viewers to be patient and savor the toney banter among the principals to carry them along until the intensified rhythm and ingenious developments in Act 2.

Coward's dialogue is an actor's paradise, loaded with glorious verbiage and wit, and here it's smoothly delivered by a cast comfortably attuned to its musical cadence. Yard is excellent at conveying Charles' shifting moods.

At first he's shocked and panicked that Elvira has come back to haunt him after seven years. Then you see him gradually warm up to her as she plays mischievously and affectionately on his heartstrings.

It's a performance delivered with sophisticated assurance and a polished mixture of hauteur and vulnerability, as he tries to make sense of it all and reconcile his dilemma as expediently as possible. Becker may struggle at times with a viable English accent, but she more than makes up for it with a thoroughly ingratiating turn as Elvira, displaying abundant coquettish calculation with deviously employed timing.

DeVere matches Yard's dry martini performance with one of her own as Ruth, coated with a convincing patrician sheen. She and Yard, who happen to be a real life husband and wife, handle their verbal exchanges with the supple dexterity of two tennis players volleying effortlessly back and forth.

Tartaglia's Madame Arcati bubbles with outsized eccentricity and a wonderful compilation of grand gestures. She is the demonstrative ying to Candace Schap's deadpan yang take on Mrs. Bradman, one of the two guests Charles has invited to the seance.

Schap enunciates her lines with very funny minimal enthusiasm. John Wright is quite dapper as the distinguished Dr. Bradman. Rachel Savage provides some memorably comic moments as the Condomines' antic maid, Edith.

Goodney's set is astonishingly designed and has a furnished living room that takes full advantage of the play's supernatural elements. The background music is well-chosen for each scene.

Don't miss out, tickets are on sale now! Call 508-753-4383 to order by phone or order online http://www.wcloc.org.

WCLOC Playhouse
21 Grandview Avenue
Worcester, MA 01603

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