Don’t men go to the theater anymore?
Scan the current audiences at the Kravis Center’s Rinker Playhouse, or the Parker Playhouse in Fort Lauderdale, and you would swear the answer is a resounding “No.” Not only are there almost no men in attendance, but the shows on view — Divorce Party The Musical and Love, Loss and What I Wore — are so female-centric, so calculated for “girls’ night out” group sales, that guys seemingly need not apply.
Still, there are distinct qualitative differences between the two shows. The former, a raunchy intervention bash for a recent divorcee, is the brainchild of the producer of Menopause The Musical, one of the most artistically impoverished stage pieces to ever become an international commercial success. The latter is great theatrical literature by comparison, though it is actually just a pleasant string of monologues and group readings about the clothes women allow themselves to be defined and confined by.
Based on a book by Ilene Beckerman, then filtered through the sensibilities of sisters Nora and Delia Ephron, Love, Loss has been playing off-Broadway since October 2009, with a rotating cast of female performers who sit on stools and read, from music stands, reminiscences about fashion anguish that strike undeniable chords with the crowd.
The mere mention of a Kelly bag — that high-priced Hermes-level purse popularized by Grace Kelly in the 1950s — sent murmurs of recognition through the audience. But even the completely fashion-challenged, like me, can appreciate the show’s gentle comic manner and well-calibrated poignancy.
The touring production at the Parker Playhouse is a little short on box office name power, but not on talent. Loretta Swit of TV’s M*A*S*H is probably the biggest name of the quintet, though she seemed removed from the group, reduced largely to announcing the titles of subject segments and playing one continuing character, a serial bride and divorcee.
Sesame Street veteran Sonia Manzano delivered a touching monologue on surviving breast cancer and the indignities of breast reconstruction. Daisy Eagan (Tony Award winner for The Secret Garden) and Emily Dorsch were well-paired on a piece about the difficulties of finding a suitable wedding dress, and Myra Lucretia Taylor was a standout with a rant against purses. Either it was the best-written segment of the show or she made it seem so.
Love, Loss and What I Wore is hardly a must-see event, but pleasant enough that you will not mind having taken the plunge. And that goes for male theatergoers, too.
On the other hand, Divorce Party The Musical seems cynically devised to attract the Menopause audience and cash in on that earlier show’s success. It too relies on parody lyrics to existing pop songs to celebrate female empowerment.
There’s nothing wrong with that, of course, but the new show manages to make its predecessor look good, sinking as it does to even crasser depths, with songs and skits about shaving one’s pubic hair and the joys of battery-operated vibrators and other sex toys. As if that were not titillating enough, Divorce Party features a male stripper going full monty just after the show’s finale, which is one way to eliminate the usual Kravis stampede to the exits during the curtain calls.
The show stems from a book by Boca Raton divorce coach Amy Botwinick, titled Congratulations on Your Divorce — The Road to Finding Your Happily Ever After. Whatever the message of that self-help book may be, it is reduced here to bonding with your female friends, have a makeover and start living again.
The stage show concerns recently uncoupled Linda (Janna Cardia), who has sought solace from her marriage in containers of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream and bags of Doritos. Enter her divorced therapist sister Carolyn (Felicia Finley), her playing-the-field lesbian cousin Courtney (Janet Dickinson) and her close friend Sheila (Soara-Joye Ross), whose marriage is shaky at best.
They try to rouse her from her stupor, in part by introducing her to a male yoga teacher, a tango instructor and a beauty consultant, all played by Scott Ahearn, who also gets the stripper assignment.
As with Menopause The Musical, director/lyricist Jay Falzone opts for fairly predictable rhymes and rarely develops anything past the single joke of the initial verse. In truth, none of the audience members I observed seemed to mind the uninspired writing.
Perhaps the most annoying thing about Divorce Party is that the audience appeared to be adequately entertained by it, so there is reason to believe it could become as successful as Menopause.
LOVE, LOSS AND WHAT I WORE, Parker Playhouse, 707 N.E. 8th St., Fort Lauderdale. Continuing through Sunday. Tickets: $37-$57. Call 954-462-0222.
DIVORCE PARTY THE MUSICAL, Kravis Center Rinker Playhouse, 701 Okeechobee Blvd., West Palm Beach. Continuing through Sunday, Feb. 19. Tickets: $25-$32. Call: (561) 832-7469 or (800) 572-8471.