STAGE REVIEW : Opposites Detract: Little Tension in ‘Elaine’s Daughter’

Mayo Simon wanted to write a comedy. But “Elaine’s Daughter,” which opened last weekend at the International City Theatre in Long Beach, isn’t entirely funny. Nor is it your usual anguish-laden mother-daughter tug of war. It’s all-out revolution. Part of the play’s quirky appeal is that it eludes pigeonholing. But that in itself becomes a problem. It is, by any definition, a look askance at a late-blooming daughter in desperate search for herself.

Not easy. Equally not for her widowed mother, Elaine (Renee Taylor), who has to watch it. Daughter Beth (Rachel Levin) is 26, plain, awkward, angry, bossy, intractable and living at home. Beth will tell anyone who cares to listen that she is there because her mother is a total nerd who needs looking after.

But the Elaine we meet is a gentle, somewhat antiquated housewife who would like nothing better than to have another man to cook for and to please. This sends Beth into feminist paroxysms. Worse, Elaine has found herself such a man. In the personal ads. Such bold and bewildering enterprise only confirms Beth’s favorite theory: that her mother is insane.

Beth professes not to need men. Her best friend is Tommy (Bill Brochtrup), an affable gay guy who has seen her through crises and knows to come when she calls. Beth enlists his help to scare away Elaine’s new beau--a monosyllabic retired fireman named Gus (Carmine Caridi, deceptively understated). But when Gus turns out to have a son, Eliot (David Anthony Smith), whom Beth finds irresistibly attractive, Tommy’s called on again for help of another sort.

From these unlikely strands Simon has spun a tender if imperfect tale of endurance. He’s too evenhanded. In his apparent wish to be honest and fair and see the good in everyone, the possibilities for real conflict or real comedy appear neutralized. Perhaps as a consequence, Jules Aaron’s direction at Long Beach can’t seem to find a flash point.

Beth and Elaine may fight, but we know they love each other. Beth can be perfectly hateful, but we know it’s self-defense. Or a bluff. Or a freakout. What we don’t know is how she got there. Something here is incomplete.

We see Elaine as a kind woman who musters enough humor and equanimity to get through this difficult patch with Beth, but where’s the rebellion in her? Are these women learning from each other? Taylor plays Elaine so soft, sainted and self-effacing, and Levin delivers such an onslaught with her clamorous Beth, that there is no contest. These two could go on like this forever.

Simon does make a pass at a resolution that has the ring of hope at the end, but, in this production at least, it isn’t earned. We need to see other dimensions of both women, perhaps more of the past that shaped and binds them--some development in Elaine, more worldliness in Beth, who has not always been a recluse. This is not to suggest that the play should deliver Psychoanalysis 101, but that the audience needs help it isn’t getting making connections.

We really need to know more about everyone. Tommy’s so game and willing to hold Beth’s hand that, when he puts up unexpected defenses, the action is more puzzling than revealing. Most perplexing of all, however, is Eliot. The play, like Beth, perks up when he walks in (credit actor Smith’s engaging and centered performance), and it looks as if he will be pivotal to the turn of events. He is, and while Simon gives him that important role (a love scene is skillfully achieved with a beautiful exchange of poetry), he cuts it off too abruptly, leaving the ending vague and seemingly tacked on.

Some of this flabbiness may be attributable to Aaron’s overly measured staging, which doesn’t extract the necessary juices out of the actors--or set them flowing. Paulie Jenkins’ lighting and Martha Ferrara’s costumes work well enough, but Don Gruber’s wallpapered set is uninviting and requires the actors to push their own furniture around. It’s a conceit this problematic production could probably do without.

“Elaine’s Daughter” was to have been the inaugural production of the Long Beach Center Theatre’s new repertory season in February, until budgetary shortfalls prompted cancellation of the project.

At Harvey Way and Clark Ave ., on the Long Beach City College campus, Thursdays through Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 2 and 7:30 p.m., until Sept. 9. $12; (213) 420-4128, 420-4275 or 480-3232.