Excerpted from The City Paper, Toledo, Ohio, Page ?, May 10 - 16, 2001
Curtain Call
By Alyce Lutomski
P.O.'d domestic engineers
It was a cult hit in Seattle, and now it’s storming the country! “Angry Housewives” hits the Village
Players’ Upton Street stage with a rebel yell May 11-26.
Sure, it’s the funny musical about four housewives who form a punk-rock band, but it’s also a warm and genuine look at everyday people, who find their lives missing something.
For widowed Bev (Marcia Weisenburger — you won’t believe it’s her stage debut!) it’s money. Before Roger died, she sold Avon and raised their son, Tim (Joe Burke — a Sylvania Southview junior who is into standup, magic and theater). It’s been rough: Bev tries to make ends meet, staring down the throat of a job at Jack-In-The-Box and dealing with Tim — all teen-age angst — who is practicing for a punk-rock band contest.
The women meet at Bev’s to experiment with selling makeup. Jetta (Jennifer Nagy — back after acting in the Big Apple and Boston) is under the thumb of her attorney husband, Larry (Matt Wiederhold — whose uptight character undergoes a long, strange trip). Carol (Elaine Wood — River’s End Player and planner for the Loss Realty Group’s company functions) is a divorcée seeking more from life.
Spunky Wendi (Marisol Mejia-Sands, a University of Toledo mechanical engineering student and no stranger to UT theater, including “Equus”), is the adventurous idea person. She gets Tim’s band contest flyer and springs her plan on her pals. “We’re gonna start a punk-rock band!”
She’s met with scorn and skepticism — the same reaction she got from her prizewinning fisherman boyfriend Wallace (Michael Leonard — original member of Today Productions and an OC training/development specialist.) But the ball gets rolling when the women decide “Life is supposed to be fun!”
In a boisterous scene in Bev’s kitchen, they overcome their biggest hurdle: the music.
“Kum Ba Yah” just won’t translate to punk. But the repressed Jetta, in a wild transformation, comes up with a beaut: “Eat Your
F’ing Cornflakes!” (Yes, there is some adult language.) All they need is a name — and it’s a natural: “Angry Housewives.”
The new band shows up at the club, Lewd Fingers. It turns out that Wallace and Lewd (real name Conrad Michaels III) were in school together, and the pair reminisce about “The girl most likely to...”
The songs are a treat — from Wood’s bluesy “Generic Wo-man” to Nagy’s moving “I’m not at home in my own house” to the reggae “Stalling For Time.”
Multi-talented Brenda Sweeney directs this outrageous and witty show with emotional depth. Hats off, too, to music director Deb Wlodarski on keyboards and to drummer Ray Wood and Dave Begley on guitar and bass. Info: 419/472-6817.
Alyce Lutomski is a Toledo-area Theater enthusiast. To contact Alyce Lutomski, e-mail alyce@toledocitypaper.com
Last Modified: 02/25/06