Simon's 'Rumors' ignites Intime with energy

This Thursday, prolific American playwright Neil Simon's "Rumors" goes up for its second and last weekend at Theatre Intime. So popular during the '60s and '70s that he once had four shows on Broadway simultaneously, Simon won Tony Awards for "The Odd Couple" (1965), "Biloxi Blues" (1985), and "Lost in Yonkers" (1991).

Set in the upper class living room of host and hostess Charlie and Myra Brock on the evening of their 10th wedding anniversary party, the play opens with the arrival of guests, Chris and Ken Gorman (Amy Widdowson '06 and Tom Harrits '05), who are horrified and scandalized to find Charlie shot through the earlobe, Myra missing altogether and "the help" gone as well.

As three other couples filter in, bringing with them cases of whiplash, car wreck trauma, back spasms, over the top "couple baby talk" and posh indifference, Ken and Chris spend the first act making up outrageous explanations for their hosts' absence, tripping about in a hysterical effort to keep the other guests in the dark. The act closes in an explosion of door-slamming, running, bashing about, shouting and flying dinner rolls.

Ken is now deaf as a result of a second gun shot; Chris is drunk; Glenn and Cassie Cooper (Robert Kennelly '06 and Blythe Haaga '05) have fallen apart at the seams after a quartz crystal-induced fist fight; Cookie and Ernie Cusack (Carolyn Pichert '05 and Alex Adam '07) have burned and diced themselves trying to get dinner together in the kitchen; and Claire and Lenny Ganz (Sherry Rujikarn '06 and Jon Ryan '06) have convinced themselves and everyone else that the whole thing was the result of an affair of Charlie's or Myra's or both and that "the help" has run off to "somewhere in the Orient."

With dust from the figurative and literal explosions settled, dinner plates, glasses and purses scattered about the stage, bodies draped over chairs and sofas, the second act begins. When two policemen arrive, the guests are forced to offer up an explanation they do not have. The party ends where it began, floating about in a puddle of rumors on a raft made of wisecracks and sidesplitting banter.

A major strength of the play is the lighthearted integrity of the actors. Haaga jokingly noted in her program bio that she had approached the play "with the seriousness of a peacock defending her nest from a pack of coyotes." Indeed, she and the rest of the cast seem to throw themselves into their roles with the conviction that comedy is no laughing matter — and then to laugh despite themselves at that very seriousness. Clearly delighted to deliver punch line after punch line, they make the play engaging from beginning to end.

Costumes are simple, evening gowns and tuxes likely owned by the students who wore them. They are brought to life by the actors, as when the women make great show of sizing up each other's gowns, asking which terminal illness they had "bought for" — cerebral palsy or sickle cell.

The set, likewise, is simple and realistic. It calls no particular attention to itself, but rather allows Simon's farce to run rampant in the constant movement and circulation of cast members that bring it to life. Only a few props appear on stage: liquor bottles and drinks glasses, a telephone, a boxed and wrapped gift of shattered Steuben glass. The cast makes use of each. A prominently placed sofa, coffee table, and stairwell lend a feeling of having walked into another family's home and also allow for a great deal of falling up, down and over, serving as props for much of the play's fast-paced and athletically ridiculous action. The play offers gleefully exhausting momentum.

Director Ben Fast '06 seems to have focused on the importance of this exaggerated momentum, a crucial element of farce, as he worked with the cast and script.

"I really wanted the actors to go all the way" Fast said. "I would continually tell them, 'Make it bigger. Make it more outrageous. I don't want people taking you seriously. You are caricatures, not real people."

This characterization and deliberate exaggeration make watching the play engaging and enjoyable, as audience member Natalie Lockwood '06 said.

"My experience with Intime has been that sometimes the plays tend to be so avant-garde that they don't appeal to people who are just looking for something entertaining to watch on a Friday night. In that sense, Rumors is a great middle-of-the-road play — it's comical without being too dark and quirky without being completely bizarre," Lockwood said.

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Come laugh at upper class suburbanite couples; come laugh with the group of seriously talented Princetonians who play them. At one point in the play, Lenny dispels a concern about cholesterol by slapping Ernie on the shoulder and telling him, "We didn't come here to live longer Ernie, just to have a good time." Take Lenny's advice, forget your cholesterol, your papers and problem sets, and come just to have a good time.