STAGE REVIEW : ‘Coffee’ a Watery Brew

It had to be tantalizing for officials at the Pasadena Playhouse, where the West Coast premiere of Preston Sturges’ 1931 comedy, “A Cup of Coffee,” opened Sunday, to know that, circa 1940, this play had briefly been destined for . . . . the Pasadena Playhouse.

“A Cup of Coffee” never made it to Pasadena, becoming instead a Paramount Pictures film retitled “Christmas in July.” No stage version happened until New York’s Soho Rep and director Larry Carpenter exhumed and staged the play in 1988.

Now Carpenter has restaged it in Pasadena with a new cast. Call it bringing coals to Newcastle or pigeons home to roost, but watching this play more than a half-century after it failed to make its cross-town move is like watching time stand still.

In tone and character, “A Cup of Coffee” is 1940s Pasadena Playhouse fare: a cockeyed, naturalistic, improbable, good-natured Depression-era comedy, where nothing is deep, hope springs eternal, the good guys win--and the film potential is a real cinch.

So . . . take the play as it is offered: as nostalgic brew, watery in the extreme, not to be taken seriously (except by the artists) and apt for launching the theater’s so-called 75th anniversary season (if you forget about the several seasons when the Playhouse was dark in more ways than one).

“Cup of Coffee” ( not an inspired title) is the flimsy tale of Jimmy MacDonald, a young $25-a-week salesman at the Baxter Coffee warehouse, who enters a slogan-writing contest for a rival company. When he wins it, and the $25,000 prize that goes with it, MacDonald’s fortunes soar.

Oliver and Bloodgood, the Baxter brothers who run Baxter’s with (or in spite of) their elderly father Ephraim, make MacDonald a superlucrative offer in an effort to hang on to what they suddenly decide are his terrific ideas. But when a momentary muddle casts doubt over the outcome of the contest, true friends and true colors manifest themselves with a vengeance. All ends happily because this is a comedy, remember?

“A Cup of Coffee” may tout “Baxter’s Best,” but it’s not Sturges’ best, and what little is there unfolds at a snail’s pace in Act I. Things pick up with Acts II and III, but the tone and texture of this piece creak. They belong in the ‘30s and ‘40s and are rescued here only by the outstanding performances of Raye Birk as bloodthirsty Bloodgood, and Robert Cornthwaite as the whimsical patriarch Ephraim--a man who wickedly measures what’s left of his mettle by the degree to which he can make grown sons cower.

Cornthwaite is a joy, playing the wheelchair-bound Ephraim as benignly cantankerous--a shrewd, catnapping old devil who has overstayed his usefulness, but won’t give his sons the thrill of running the company without him, especially not Bloodgood, whom he loves to needle, deride and thwart every chance he gets.

Birk’s ability to give us both the mean-spirited bully in Bloodgood and the speechless neurotic he shrivels to in his father’s presence, constitutes comedy of the highest order: rich in minutiae, yet not averse to relying on occasional slapstick. A gorgeous portrayal.

The rest of the company relies on stereotype. Michael Heintzman, who created the role at Soho Rep, is the winning, wet-behind-the-ears, young salesman Jimmy, whose roller-coaster fortunes drive the piece. Angie Phillips is Tulip, the office stenographer in love with him, whose feminism is refreshing and whose brassiness, in the end, saves Jimmy’s job.

Less crucial (and less interesting) portraits are contributed by David Cromwell as the milquetoast Oliver, George Ede as a blustery old cashier named Whortleberry, and by Willie C. Carpenter as a rather urbane attendant to old Ephraim, who likes to tipple on the side and worm dollar bills out of Whortleberry for “expenses.”

John Towey and Charles Leon adequately deliver assorted cameos--the kinds of roles no actors should have to play and playwrights no longer write.

Mark Wendland’s dusty and musty setting for the behind-the-times Baxter Coffee warehouse has abundant period detail and is lit accordingly by Martin Aronstein. Costumes by Nancy Konrardy reflect the ‘30s and the care and attention director Carpenter has lavished on the production.

There’s no question that he’s caught the flavor of this “Cup of Coffee.” What he can’t much improve on is its strength.

Willie C. Carpenter: Julius Snaith

George Ede: Lomax Whortleberry

Raye Birk: J. Bloodgood Baxter

David Cromwell: Oliver Baxter

Angie Phillips: Tulip Jones

Robert Cornthwaite: Ephraim Baxter

Michael Heintzman: James MacDonald

John Towey: Postman/Sign Painter/Rasmussen

Charles Leon: Young man

A Pasadena Playhouse presentation in association with Theatre Corporation of America. Director Larry Carpenter. Playwright Preston Sturges. Sets Mark Wendland. Lights Martin Aronstein. Costumes Nancy Konrardy. Production stage manager Mary Michele Miner. Stage manager Daniel Munson.