By Neal Newman
August 7, 2022
The play begins with a long silent sequence with an older husband and wife serving dinner. Evidently, they have done these things thousands of times before and have nothing to say. Finally, the wife speaks: “I want a divorce.” The husband gives no reaction and says: “All right.” The audience roars with laughter. The scene immediately segues to a gathering with the grown children, two sons, and a daughter-in-law. They are baffled. The hilarious sequence that follows proceeds to satirize how children cannot view their parents as complete people with normal human feelings.
What is this? Bess Wohl’s GRAND HORIZONS looks and feels like a Neil Simon comedy. The jokes come fast and furious, and the audience howls. Yet something is different. These characters are not two-dimensional joke machines, forcing the actors to struggle to find any trace of humanity. These are real people dealing with serious themes: aging, relationships, children, and that familiar feeling that we haven’t yet achieved all that we might. These characters are a gold mine for experienced actors; without exception, these performers find the treasure.
The mother and father seem to be an ordinary bunch. Married fifty years, they have a not very varied relationship. Marcia Saunders as the mother, looks a little more discontented, while Peter DeLaurier, as the father, seems a typical stick-in-the-mud. What a journey these easily identifiable humans will take before the final curtain.
This includes the two sons, one a masculine stalwart soon to be a father (Dante Alexander), the other a self-involved, troubled gay high school theatre teacher (Brian McManamon.) They have a lot to learn and the laughs built when they discover that these parents have unusual masturbational fantasies and some past secrets that will soon be revealed.
Saunders carries much of the load here and is heartfelt, human, and simultaneously comic. DeLaurier has the most maturing to do and succeeds when the couple delivers an impressive final scene. McManamon proves to be a resourceful physical actor whose gyrations during his mother’s confessions bring down the house. The daughter-in-law, Jenelle Chu, starts as one of those too-smart psychotherapists (“Have you tried holding hands?”) but grows in unexpected ways as the play progresses. Luis Augusto Figueroa and Zuleyma Guevara provide able support in one scene cameos that help define the leading players.
Bess Wohl is quite the playwright to have pulled off such severe themes. Is this boulevard comedy for the twenty-first century? She also provides a memorable first act curtain event.
Scenic and Lighting Designer Paul Whitaker has designed the perfect Malvern/King of Prussia retirement community apartment. It is named Grand Horizons, and it is precisely like the apartments found right here. How canny People’s Light is to schedule a show where the audience actually dwells in the setting and resembles the main characters. The lighting is first-rate as well. Costumer Katherine Roth has created real people who obviously shop at our local mall.
All this excellent cohesion must be credited to director Jackson Gay, whose work is masterly.
Don’t miss it. The closing date is August 28.
Running Time: Two hours with an intermission. Masks are required.