Most of American Century Theater’s shows fall into one of two categories: unjustly neglected works that deserve rediscovery, or plays that are so hopelessly dated that there is no plausible excuse to revive them. Their latest offering, Kurt Vonnegut’s 1970 black comedy “Happy Birthday, Wanda June,” belongs in a third category: It is very much a product of its period, but that is part of what makes it such an interesting historical curio.
A satiric riff on Homer’s “The Odyssey” and Tennyson’s “Enoch Arden,” “Happy Birthday, Wanda June” tells the story of Harold Ryan (William Aitkin), soldier-of-fortune, big-game hunter and thinly disguised Ernest Hemmingway caricature, who has been declared legally dead after vanishing in the Amazon jungle eight years earlier. His wife, appropriately named Penelope (Kari Ginsburg), currently has two suitors: pacifist physician Dr. Norbert Woodly (Brian Crane) and vacuum salesman Herb Shuttle (Brian Razzino), vying for her hand in marriage.
Just as Penelope confides to her son Paul (played alternately by Andrew Newman and Adin Walker) that she is accepting Norbert’s proposal, right on cue enters Harold and his slow-witted pilot Looseleaf Harper (Joe Cronin), very much alive and suffering from a serious case of future shock from the social and cultural changes that have taken place since their disappearance.
Aitkin, Ginsburg, Cronin and Razzino do fine work, but the other performances are uneven. The same goes for Ellen Dempsey’s direction. The scenes set in Heaven — in which the dead characters, including the title role (a little girl run over by an ice cream truck on her birthday), comment on the foibles of the living characters — are among the play’s funniest, but the staging of these scenes are particularly clumsy.
The real star, however, is Vonnegut’s clever script. Although the issues discussed are presented in fairly simplistic, one-sided terms, at least Vonnegut, like George Bernard Shaw, had the class to give the best lines to the character he was the most morally opposed to (i.e., Harold Ryan).
“Happy Birthday, Wanda June” is not a great play, but it is a fascinating and amusing snap-shot of a turning point in American history.
‘Happy Birthday, Wanda June’
The American Century Theater’s production runs through Saturday
» Venue: Gunston Arts Center’s Theatre II, 2700 S. Lang St., Arlington
» Performances: 8 p.m. Wednesday to Friday; 2:30 and 8 p.m. Saturday
» Tickets: $23 to $26
» More info: 703-998-4555, americancentury.org
