Brighton Beach Memoirs a theatrical success

Written by Barbara Shainbaum   

Tuesday, 24 November 2009

TORONTO – Brighton Beach Memoirs, Neil Simon’s rich, funny yet poignant semi-autobiographical play, which opened the 2009-10 Teatron Jewish Theatre’s season (Nov. 11-22) certainly drew crowds and soldout nights at the Toronto Centre for the Arts.

Written in 1983 and the winner of the New York Drama Critic's Circle award for best play, it focuses on the Jeromes, a New York Jewish family, in the Brighton Beach section of Brooklyn in 1937, during the Depression, chronicling the coming-of-age story of 15-year-old Eugene Jerome who wants to be a writer someday, but whose immediate concerns fixate on baseball and seeing his lovely cousin, Nora, naked.

When each of the characters, (two families living together in one house), want more independence and try striking out on their own, conflicts arise within the play: Blanche’s 16-year-old daughter Nora, the object of Eugene’s desire, has an opportunity to audition as a Broadway dancer; Eugene’s older brother Stanley, considers joining the army after gambling away his money; Blanche has accepted a dinner date with a drunken Irish non-Jew and the family fears she might marry him; Kate and sister Blanche experience a major blow-up that releases 20 years of  resentment, making Blanche want to move out.

The family’s centre cannot hold, and repressed feelings come pouring out, threatening to blow them apart. The consequences of their actions are affecting and believable, making the play emotionally satisfying.

Directed and produced by Teatron’s Artistic Director Ari Weisberg, Brighton Beach Memoirs, was headed up with a strong cast: B.J. Jeroy as Eugene Jerome, made a convincing and comic young Woody Allen-like character. Nicole Fairbairn anchored the stage as gritty, aproned and long-suffering matriarch Kate Jerome, caring for two sons and her widowed sister, Blanche. Jeanette Tyzer as Blanche Morton, Kate’s live-in, unemployed, widowed sister, invested her character with a suitable plaintive yet engaging determination. Jordan Cohen as Stanley Jerome, Eugene's wayward older teenage brother who prefered work instead of education, inhabited him with a dominant and youthful air. Arnie Zweig as Eugene’s father, Jack Jerome, the sole family provider struggling to support his extended family while holding down several jobs, conveyed the necessary browbeaten quality mixed with understanding, underplayed humour and resilience. Vanessa Graymason as Nora Morton, the object of Eugene’s libido, captured her character’s good-girl qualities mixed with growing sensuality and independence. Laella Saffer as Nora’s ill sister Laurie Morton, effectively showed how she uses her heart-murmur to advantage.

Undertones of impending war and the uncertain fate of the family’s European relatives, added a sombre edge to the drama. However, this being a Neil Simon play, it was  seasoned with enough humour and zingy one-liners mouthed by the young Eugene, the playwright’s alter ego.

Impressive sets by Ed Rosing, realistic period costumes by Adrienne Baker, the strong cast, and deeply-felt and well-paced direction by Ari Weisberg, made Brighton Beach Memoirs a theatrical success. Certainly the audience, who gave it a standing ovation the night I attended, responded to the play’s pathos and humour contained within Simon’s messy family drama.