STAGE REVIEWS : Newport Serves Loving but Bland Fare at ‘Picnic’

For one shining, naked moment a surge of real feeling breaks through the caricature of William Inge’s “Picnic” now being presented with loving but awkward affection at the Newport Theatre Arts Center.

It comes at the beginning of the second act when a spinsterish school teacher of fiery temperament and seemingly independent mind sinks to her knees and humbly begs her dithering, longtime fiance to keep his repeated promises to marry her.

Brenda Parks, as the schoolteacher Rosemary, not only skirts the scene’s obvious potential for bathos but fleshes out its poignancy with a muffled desperation that reaches deep into the essence of Inge’s art.

Keeping pace with her as Howard, a timid small-town businessman with a weakness for the bottle and an excessive concern for public opinion, McCullon Smith even manages to leaven the scene with mild comic relief. His broken promises seem more pathetic than hateful.

But the rest of this “Picnic” leaves a great deal to be desired in terms of the acting and casting, despite all the apparent care lavished on the production. So many of the players seem stilted and uncomfortable on stage that whatever allowances one has to make for an amateur performances just aren’t enough to compensate.

Like all of Inge’s nearly plotless plays, “Picnic” depends very heavily on atmosphere to work its theatrical magic. This production’s egregious lack of shadings and texture, however, results in a thin cartoon. Except for that second-act scene, it barely hints at the repressed emotions smoldering beneath the prim surface of the Midwest back yard in which Inge sets his characters.

In fact, Rosemary and Howard are not the focal point of the play. “Picnic” actually revolves around Madge (Wendy Abas), the prettiest girl in town, and Hal (Scott Reid), a handsome drifter with a checkered past and a braggadocio manner who has been hired by a neighbor to do her yardwork.

The play, as written, leaves no question that Madge and Hal are destined for each other from the moment they lock eyes. The only issue is how that will develop. After all, everyone in town (and especially Madge’s mother) considers it a foregone conclusion that one day soon Madge will marry Alan, the nice rich boy from the other side of the tracks who dotes on her beauty.

Both Abas and Reid look their parts. She could very well have been elected her high school’s beauty queen. And while he clearly seems too old for the role (it’s hard to believe he recently dropped out of college), he does cut a sleekly muscular figure with his shirt off, as required.

But Hal’s sheer animal magnetism--which is supposed to drive the play with its subversive psychological force--eludes Reid by a country mile. He projects some slight charm, none of the athletic grace he is said to possess and a lot of colorless personality.

Abas is far more natural. But she seems to be acting in a vacuum. She has nothing to work with or against. Not surprisingly, Madge’s romance with Hal evokes little passion. At the same time her yearning to be taken for more than just a pretty face goes no better than skin deep.

Meanwhile, director Phyllis Gitlin’s casting of Rory Castanon as Madge’s younger sister Millie is particularly jarring. Millie is supposed to be 16 years old. Castanon plays so young on stage she seems barely 12 (which, for all we know, she may be)--certainly not a budding tomboy on the verge of womanhood. This makes certain aspects of the play a real puzzle.

It hardly seems possible, for instance, that Hal could take Millie on a date or that Howard would let her get drunk on his whiskey. And the idea that she feels jealous of Madge’s beauty because of sexual rivalry seems absurd.

Unfortunately, Robin Dunne gives a monotonous reading of Flo, their mother, a former beauty herself, who desperately wants Madge to avoid making the same mistake she did by falling in love with the wrong man. The labored characterization vitiates whatever sympathy we’re meant to feel for Flo.

As for the rest of the cast, they play their roles with varying degrees of mugging. Damian Papahronis doesn’t do badly as Alan, though. And Corrine Ehlers fusses and flutters in a reasonably subdued way as Helen Potts, the neighbor.

Physically, the production succeeds best. The quaint back-yard set and the period costumes--both well done--underscore the devotion lavished on this amateur “Picnic.”

‘Picnic’

Corrine Ehlers: Helen Potts

Scott Reid: Hal Carter

Rory Castanon: Millie Owens

Stuart James: Bomber

Wendy Abas: Madge Owens

Robin Dunne: Flo Owens

Brenda Parks: Rosemary Sydney

Damian Papahronis: Alan Seymour

Ken Walker: Irma Kronkite

Carmen Jurado: Christine Schoenwalder

McCullon Smith: Howard Bevans

A Newport Theatre Arts Center presentation of William Inge’s play. Directed by Phyllis Gitlin. Produced by Larry Blake. Set design by Martin G. Eckmann. Costumes by Mary Sullivan Slack and Rae Cohen. Lighting by Larry Davis. Set painting by Marge Swenson. Choreography by Wendy Abas. Through Oct. 11 at 2501 Cliff Drive, Newport Beach. Performances Thursdays through Saturdays at 8 p.m.; Sundays at 2 p.m. $15. (714) 631-0288.