Stage Light

With a kind of unprecedented candor, the press release for Roy and Tree Washburne’s Christmas play “Ma” labels it “sappy, sentimental.”

This is a strange kind of true confession, but it may have something to do with the uncommon, indefinable phenomenon that happens at Christmas, when it’s suddenly OK for everyone to go sappy, sentimental.

We may like our family gatherings to be that way, and we definitely like our old Christmas movies to be that way--witness the perennials “Miracle on 34th Street” and Frank Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

“Ma,” at the Gene Bua Theatre, wants to be about a family gathering, and also wants to serve up Capra-corn about hard times at Yuletide and how loved ones and goodness can pull us through.

“Ma” also wants to be loved, but its messiness and unearned sentiments make it awfully hard to.

Director Roy Washburne has coached all the players in this double-cast show (with a year’s experience, since this was also staged in Christmas ‘97) to act as if they’re improvising as a boisterous, sometimes hysterical Italian-American clan in Jersey City. This sometimes lends the feeling that we’re eavesdropping on a private gathering, except when the written dialogue kicks in again.

Then, it’s just another bad piece of sappy sentiment. Ironically, the major factor that cuts against this tone is Ma herself. Bobbie Norman (alternating with Maria Falzone) strikes us as a no-nonsense, solid gal who could throw a party or cut a business deal.

The evening’s only interesting moments are in fact Norman’s: First, when Ma absorbs lesbian daughter Nette’s (Joanne Nerlino alternating with Maureen Enright) planned wedding to lover Margie (Tree Washburne alternating with Celeste Russi); second, when Ma realizes her loser brother-in-law Vinnie (actorish Gary Cusano alternating with Luke Sabis) has robbed her. For a few moments, some real emotion.

The rest feels thrown together, or trite, or contrived for effect. The especially meandering first scene, which introduces everyone at great length, never seems to end. What conflicts there are run along the lines of a nosy Southern Baptist woman named--what else?--Dixie (Lisa Records alternating with Natalia Schroeder) clashing horns with the home’s super-Catholic grandmother (rock-solid Rosina Pinchot alternating with CeCe Baker) or with super-witch Margie. This doesn’t stop Jesus-loving Dixie, though, from joining one of Margie’s Wiccan rituals, which nearly everyone in this Catholic house is inexplicably acquainted with.

Actually, “Ma” is less sap and more soup, where just about anything from passing wind to balloon-making to custody papers to being a “Titanic” extra is thrown into the pot. It’s not very pretty, certainly not as pretty as director-author Washburne’s cheery Christmas light display throughout the theater.

“Ma,” Gene Bua Theatre, 3435 W. Magnolia Blvd., Burbank. Fridays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7 p.m. Ends Jan. 10. (Dark Dec. 25-27). $12.50-$17.50. (818) 705-2370. Running time: 2 hours.