STAGE REVIEWS : So, ‘What’s Wrong?’ Answer Is ‘Nothing’

Life after death. It’s a theme sure to draw in anyone who has lost someone dear and wants desperately to see that person again.

The ancient Greeks told a tale of the dead returning from the underworld: By playing his music sweetly, Orpheus attempted to bring back his beloved Eurydice. On stage and film, stories as diversely tragic and comic as “Hamlet,” “Blithe Spirit,” “Da,” “Ghost” and even the recent Old Globe hit “Forever Plaid” explore this crossing of life and death boundaries.

The theme takes a comic twist in “What’s Wrong With This Picture?,” a play by Donald Margulies in a handsome San Diego premiere production at the Gaslamp Quarter Theatre Company’s Hahn Cosmopolitan Theatre. The play continues through Oct. 13.

Shirley (April Shawhan) doesn’t come back for any big dramatic reason; she returns because her husband Mort (Dan Halleck), and son, Artie (Brooks Ashmanskas), are hopeless when it comes to housekeeping.

After her family finishes sitting shiva (the traditional seven-day period of mourning that follows a Jewish funeral), Shirley comes back to their Brooklyn apartment to say, “I don’t even want to talk about it.” Then she jumps in the shower.

Her husband and son are astonished but delighted as this woman, who died a scant week ago from choking on a piece of moo shoo pork, emerges freshly scrubbed to redecorate, dust, polish and fix food. Not until spoilsport Grandma (Louise Merrim) objects to the inappropriateness of the dead coming back, does anyone even start to question whether Shirley should still be living there.

“What’s Wrong With This Picture?” doesn’t add much that’s new to the life-after-death genre. And its conclusions aren’t surprising. But it’s an appealing show. It has some hilarious moments and can be a downright tonic for those who have gone too long without hearing such choice Yiddish expressions as balebusteh (someone who gets things done), hocked me a chinik (nagging someone to do something), kvell (to show pride and pleasure) and nachas (joy).

Director Larry Arrick has wisely gone for the poignancy inherent in this wispy script and still manages to get plenty of laughs by having his excellent cast play it straight. With material like this, if you push for the jokes, the whole fragile structure would collapse under the strain.

That’s a mistake Arrick and his ensemble never make.

The chief pleasure of this production comes simply from how well it is done--down to the last detail. The Gaslamp has assembled one of its finest ensembles in memory. Ashmanskas plays Artie as a smart-alecky fellow whose jokes lightly mask pain and self-doubt. Halleck, who is making his San Diego debut here, portrays Mortie as hapless but strong in his complete and absolute love for his dead wife.

Jim Mohr provides sly charm as the baffled, out-of-touch old Grandpa, with a secret that has been torturing him for years. Merrim drives the story as the crusty old Grandma who has truckloads of unwelcome advice, much of it frustratingly right on target. The one familiar Gaslamp face, Rebecca Nachison as Ceil, Mort’s sister, makes a steely sidekick for Grandma. And Shawhan is a bright, sunny and most attractive Shirley, who doesn’t see the least thing wrong with this picture--not for a while at least.

The design team, too, is one of the best in memory. Nick Reid (an Old Globe and San Diego Repertory Theatre veteran) created a slightly askew apartment that supports the quirky nature of the story. The sets’ pale colors, nicely lighted by R. Craig Wolf, beautifully offset Jeanne Reith’s costumes. Reith’s designs range from the perfect cardigan that Grandpa always wears to Shirley’s luscious red sequin number that symbolizes to Mort his wife’s inimitable sense of flash and style.

Despite the laughs, “What’s Wrong With This Picture?” ends on a wistful note. Its plot, neither deep nor dark, still plays off the same sentiment expressed so well by Emily Dickenson when she wrote: “Parting is all we know of heaven/And all we need of hell.”

In its own odd, but touching way, this slight little show plays like a crazy, wishful dream. It makes you hope that the dream won’t end, but you know it must for life to go on.

‘What’s Wrong With This Picture?’

By Donald Margulies. Director, Larry Arrick. Sets, Nick Reid. Lighting, R. Craig Wolf. Costumes, Jeanne Reith. With April Shawhan, Brooks Ashmanskas, Dan Halleck, Jim Mohr, Louise Merrim, Rebecca Nachison. At 8 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays, with Sunday matinees at 2, through Oct. 13. Tickets are $20-22. At 444 4th Ave., San Diego, 234-9583.