BWW Reviews: Main Street Theater's CLOSE UP SPACE is Fantastically Funny Farce

Main Street Theater is closing their excellent 38th season with the wildly entertaining, often hilarious, and deeply moving CLOSE UP SPACE by Molly Smith Metzler. The zany dramady is a Susan Smith Blackburn Prize Finalist and had its world premiere in 2011 in a Manhattan Theatre Club staging at New York City Center Stage I. This premiere production received mixed reviews that all seemed to get too caught up on the idea that the premise isn't entirely original.

The play centers on the troubled relationship between a book editor and his teenage daughter. Behind this common conceit there is a lot of heart, humor, and stirring prose. The characters are extremely exaggerated but still find places in our hearts. The largest strain on the father-daughter relationship is how the duo has dealt with the death of the family's matriarch. The editor, proficient with the English language, comedically is not skilled in the realm of communication. He is often harshly abrupt, over analytical of other's command of the English language, and comes across as cold and distant. The teenage daughter wears her heart on her sleeve and is looking for comfort and understanding. She also has a hard time conveying her desires through the English language because of her young age. Therefore, she becomes fluently proficient in Russian and acts out a series of ridiculous scenarios to garner attention. Molly Smith Metzler's writing is quirky and intellectual, frequently reminding me of some of the best writing on NBC's Frasier.

Direction by Andrew Ruthven is exceptionally crisp and buoyant. The pacing is snappy and perfectly timed to ensure that the audience spends a majority of the evening rolling in the aisles. In the second act, when things become a bit more serious, he deftly coaches his cast to resplendently affect our hearts and resoundingly stir our souls. With every element in the comedic and dramatic aspects of the show perfectly in place and in sync, Andrew Ruthven's direction ensures that the conclusion of the piece is heartwarming and uplifting.

Rutherford Cravens excels in the role of Paul Barrow, the harried Senior Editor at Tandem Books in New York City's Midtown West. The role has echos of Fraiser's Niles Crane and was originated Off-Broadway by David Hyde Pierce. Here, Rutherford Cravens creates a character that is lovable because he is entirely disagreeable and unpleasant. He uproariously opens the play with a sardonic monologue where he rips to shreds the voicemail and e-mail correspondence from the dean at his daughter's expensive boarding school, illustrating how ineffectively and overly constructed the messages are. At one point in the monologue he dourly affirms that as an editor his job is to "emaciate prose and make it obey." The delightful mix of vehement viciousness and pretentious erudition that Rutherford Cravens imbues Paul Barrow with splits our guts time and time again. Yet, behind the virulent but cultivated bookishness façade is an emotionally vulnerable man, and it is how Rutherford Craven subtly exposes the cracks in said façade during Act I before tearing it down in Act II's explosive and compelling climax that make this character and the deeply satisfying arc he traverses resonate with impactful poignancy.

As Steve, David Wald is simply hysterical. He deftly creates a character that is so ridiculously over-the-top and boneheaded that the audience is consistently charmed by his doltish behavior. Every absurd and goofy action is acted with such affable charisma and amiable sincerity that we laugh with abandon as David Wald's Steve steals our hearts. Throughout the production David Wald's genuine and klutzy dunce portrayal had me laughing so hard that tears streamed down my cheeks more than once.

Joanna Hubbard's Harper is superbly riveting. She commands our attention as she emphatically screams at her father in perfectly enunciated Russian and plays with our heartstrings when she explores the emotional depth of her character in English with David Wald's Steve. Joanna Hubbard is stunningly dynamic as Harper, cleverly creating an embellished but realistic and tangible teenager that struggles with her own feelings and thoughts about the strained and more-or-less estranged relationship she has with her father.

Vanessa Finn Adams, skillfully played by Carolyn Johnson, is wonderfully brash, demanding, and filled with dramatic flair. She overly sensationalizes every aspect of her relationship with Rutherford Craven's Paul Barrow, wrapping him around her finger as she thinks she is surreptitiously applying crafty mental vice-clamps in an attempt to control him with her overwrought machinations.

Brittny Bush's Bailey is a true delight as she ebulliently accepts her internship at Tandem Books. She is chipper, youthful, and excited about her unpaid job. At the top of the second act, her characterization is magnificently hilarious due to an amusing progression in the plot. In these moments, Brittny Bush's Bailey is reduced to only speaking in mostly monosyllabic words for immaculately comedic effect.

Ryan McGettigan's Set Design recreates a small New York City office with ease in the performance space. His use of doors is inspired, allowing there to be two different locations in the office that blend seamlessly together for easy scene transitions.

Eric L. marsh's Lighting Design is simplistic and effective. He adeptly bathes the stage in realistic lighting. Lights are effectively and purposefully used to demarcate which part of the office the scenes are occurring in. Also, the colors outside the up stage window masterfully indicate time of day.

Sound Design by Janel J. Badrina effectively uses the chime of an elevator from appropriate locations depending on the location of the scene. It also uses New York City's street noise effectively at the end of the first act. However, my personal favorite aspect of the design was the use of songs by Dave Matthews Band and Melissa Etheridge in the pre-show music.

Costume Design by Macy Lyne is great. She uses clothing that indicates character well. I especially liked the Russian outfit assembled for Joanna Hubbard's Harper.

Main Street Theater's CLOSE UP SPACE is a fantastically funny grammatical farce that explores the language of interpersonal and familial relationships. The whimsical comedy is pristinely tinged with moments of striking emotional clarity and drama, creating a play that is highly amusing and emotionally visceral as well. The show may have gotten mixed reviews in New York, but Main Street Theater's production is so charming and intellectually alluring, that I'm sure Houston audiences will truly love this work and enjoy themselves when experiencing it.

CLOSE UP SPACE runs at Main Street Theater's Rice Village location at 2540 Times Boulevard, Houston through June 16, 2013. For more information and tickets, please visit http://mainstreettheater.com or call (713) 524 - 6706.

Photos by Kaitlyn Walker. Courtesy of Main Street Theater.

Steve (David Wald) and Paul (Rutherford Cravens).

Harper (Joanna Hubbard) and Paul (Rutherford Cravens).

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