THEATER REVIEW : ‘TASTE OF HONEY’ IS A SATISFYING MORSEL

There are many ties that bind, but few bind as tightly as the one between a mother and daughter. Their dynamic may be loving, or it may be angry, tense or competitive. Sometimes it is all these things at once, as in “A Taste of Honey,” now showing at the Deane Theatre through May 30.

Helen and her 18-year-old daughter, Jo, are at each other’s throats from the very beginning of Shelagh Delaney’s 1958 award-winning play. The two have just relocated to a seedy place because Helen was running away from a man. Much of what Helen does, in fact, is dictated by the men in or out of her life. Not surprisingly, when Jo, later, wants to get back at her mother, she does so through a man: When Helen runs off with her latest boyfriend during Christmas, Jo, a white woman, gets pregnant by a black sailor.

As Jo approaches motherhood, the question then arises as to what kind of mother she will become. All along, Jo, who is herself an illegitimate child, has clung fiercely to the idea that there are vast differences between herself and her mother. But as she comes closer to giving birth to her own illegitimate child, it is easy to see the pattern repeat itself.

Rosina Widdowson Reynolds sets the pace as Helen. She is crisp, clear and funny--a long cool drink of water whose dominant notes may be pleasure and survival, but who plays even her muted ones of love and concern with convincing clarity.

Nicole Bonsall makes a worthy foil as Josephine. Petite, blonde and rounded as Reynolds is tall, red-headed and angular, Bonsall captures the anger, taut as a bow string, that keeps her character reacting rather than acting.

The rest of the actors are not as successful.

As Geoffrey, the gay art student whose affection for Jo and her unborn child grows increasingly to love, Don Loper turns in a sensitive performance. He is not, however, as dynamic and forceful as he might be. He is also not quite as comfortable with the English accent, a problem that worsens in the performance of the otherwise very likable Walter Murray as the sailor.

The worst offender, however, is Jeffrey Zerg as Helen’s rather greasy boyfriend. Zerg is downright distracting, not just for his accent, which fluctuates wildly from an English caricature to the inflections of a Chicago gangster, but because there seems to be no internal consistency to his character: He moves from attitude to attitude without modulation.

Will Simpson’s direction is generally sound. It crackles when the women are together, but there are places, most notably in some of the scenes when the women are alone with the men, that could stand tightening.

Robert Earl’s setting is inspired. His conception of an apartment built as a wooden frame without a solid roof or walls, brings the outer industrial English city right into the flat, an important symbol in this very urban play.

The lighting by Matthew Cubitto provides a lovely, subtle play of rosy hues on the women’s drab quarters. The jazz music that occasionally wafts through is poignant and haunting. Unfortunately, John Hauser’s sound is not as pleasing when it comes to the voices of the children outside; they have an unnatural canned quality, turned on and off as abruptly as a light switch.

Dianne Holly’s costumes are again a pleasure. For most of the characters, she does not get an opportunity to be more than simple and effective, but she gets to splurge with color and style on Helen’s costumes and goes to the job with gusto. One may wonder at the elegance of the low-class Helen’s taste, but when the results are so lovely, who cares?

There is not much sweetness in “A Taste of Honey.” It is not a neatly made play; often people and moments, including the ending, trail off like loose threads. It is also not the hard-nosed shocker many believed it to be when it came out in 1958 as the first play by Delaney, who was only 18 when she wrote it. But much of the language is still choice and witty, and it does satisfy, rather like a “Terms of Endearment” with teeth.

“A TASTE OF HONEY” By Shelagh Delaney. Director, Will Simpson. Settings, Robert Earl. Lighting, Matthew Cubitto. Sound, John Hauser. Costumes, Dianne Holly. Stage manager, Cynthia M. Fraley. With Rosina Widdowson Reynolds, Nicole Bonsall, Jeffrey Zerg, Walter Murray and Don Loper. At 8 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday, with Sunday matinees at 2, through May 30. At the Deane Theatre, 547 4th Ave., San Diego.