Miners Alley Playhouse Presents a Touch of Spring
Glowing in Golden, Colorado
By: Susan Hall - Aug 19, 2011
A Touch of Spring
by Samuel Taylor
Miners Alley Playhouse
Golden, Colorado
Directed by Richard H. Pegg
Assistant Director Missy Moore
Scenic Design Richard H. Pegg
Lighting Design by Jonathan Scott-McKean
Diana Claiborne Rachel Bouchard
Sandy Claiborne Brian Landis Folkins
John Wesley Tyler Collins
Georgio, the Waiter Todd Sorensen
Baldassare Pantaleone Michael Bouchard
Allison Ames Behtnay Lillis
Vittorio Spina Brock Benson
Through August 28, 2011
Writing in the tradition of J.M. Barry and Kaufman and Hart, Samuel A. Taylor is best known as the creator of Sabrina, played by Margaret Sullivan on stage and then famously by Audrey Hepburn in film. He began writing radio plays and has screenplay credits on Hitchcock’s Vertigo and Topaz. His play Pleasure of His Company was made into a movie in which Fred Astaire in one of his few straight acting roles tries to woo back his ex-wife Lilli Palmer. Taylor’s works are wonderful confections and A Touch of Spring is no exception. Made also into a Billy Wilder movie starring Jack Lemmon, and twice as a French television movie, you won’t be surprised to find adulteries past, present and future cropping up. This is perfect summer entertainment, with a still provocative moral underpinning. Life is approached with a cheerful if puzzled grin.
Miners Alley Playhouse in Golden, Colorado (the home of Coors which offers samples on their tour) is dedicated to producing delightfully interesting professional theatre in Jefferson County. A Touch of Spring, the director Richard Pegg points out, raises complicated questions without ruining the wit of the dialogue.
What seems most unfamiliar today is the presentation of class differences. Brian Landis Folkins as the heir apparent to a worldwide pump manufacturing business because his father has died in a car crash in Italy, seems bewildered by the prospect of becoming a tycoon. He is befuddled by the Italian bureaucrats who have lost his father’s body. Folkins does the delicate job of mourning, dismissing his tyrannical wife and perhaps falling in love with passion and humor.
Taylor did not introduce Sandy's wife until the end in the original version of the play, but in this version she appears right at the front. Rachel Bouchard is coldly convincing as a domineering bitch. We are glad to see her go home. In her absence a US Embassy underling assigned to get opera tickets and buy shirts for important American travelers, is tasked with finding the body. He is done up in appropriate officiousness by Tyler Collins. The hotel staff is all gladly at the ready to assist in pleasure, romance and even sex.
Michael Bouchard as Baldo is brought in to fix things – anything really. He reports himself catholic, appreciating the pleasures of both men and women, something Sandy has not contemplated before. When Allison arrives for help finding her mother’s body, since she died in the crash that took out Sandy’s Dad, fireworks go off. What were they doing in the car together? Allison wryly withholds the answer for as long as she can. But when she is compelled to tell their parents’ secret, Allison and Sandy appear headed into a parallel course.
The dialogue is so witty and delicious that telling you what happens may not ruin the play’s pleasure, but for now you can guess. We are left wondering whether Sandy and Allison will be able to steer a course between the Scylla of an annual affair in Italy and Charybdis of responsibilities for priming pumps and mounting an acting career in London. Only a few years ago, you could get away anywhere for a fling without a posting on Facebook.
This production by the Miners Alley Playhouse is truly golden.