Review: Margie Boule Brings Tallulah Bankhead to Life in LOOPED, at Triangle Productions!

Before you head over to Triangle Productions! to see LOOPED, spend some time on YouTube watching videos of Tallulah Bankhead. Then you'll be able to really appreciate how well Margie Boule captures her onstage.

LOOPED, by Matthew Lombardo, is based on a true story of a 1965 recording session when it took eight hours for her to loop (meaning redub) a single line from her last movie Die! Die! My Darling! Part of the problem was that Tallulah herself was looped (meaning drunk). In her defense, the line she has to loop is ridiculously convoluted.

The central figure is obviously Tallulah herself. This isn't the glamorous, sensual Tallulah of her stage and film golden years. This is a worn out Tallulah near the end of her life. She's still sharp-tongued and brassy, but instead of being sexy and charming, she's bitter and, most of all, desperately lonely. While years of alcohol, cocaine, and who-knows-what-other substances undoubtedly were a factor in why it took eight hours for her to say a single line, the play shows us a vulnerable Tallulah who seems to be drawing out the process just so she can have someone to talk to, film editor Danny Miller. She's rough on him, though...she pokes and pries until he reveals his own vulnerabilities. In the end, they form a sort of kinship -- two exhausted lonely people who on this random day in 1965 found each other.

Obviously, a role like this needs the right person in it. Margie Boule is the right person. To start with, she's got the voice -- the husky drawl of an aging Southern belle who smokes 150 cigarettes a day (which Tallulah did). Boule delivers the perfect combination of brashness and vulnerability. In her portrayal, we see Tallulah in both her glory and her debasement. Sometimes she looks like a young actress with the world at her feet, and sometimes like a faded has-been. She's fantastic.

LOOPED is funny and sad (and often shocking -- Tallulah had a mouth that would make a sailor blush), and Boule's performance brings out these elements in this well-balanced, well-worth-seeing production.

LOOPED runs through September 26. For tickets, visit www.trianglepro.org.