"The Rainmaker" shines at the Ivoryton Playhouse

IVORYTON - The charming old facility that is now the Ivoryton Playhouse was built in 1911 as a recreation hall. It evolved into the first self-supporting summer stock theater in the country. It has expanded well beyond summer stock today, and offers quality theatrical productions throughout the year.

The Ivoryton Playhouse is located about an hour from the Manchester area. Probably one of the more enjoyable ways to spend the intermission between acts is to view the many photographs of famous actors who graced the Ivoryton Playhouse’s stage through the years.

The Ivoryton Playhouse is like the Holy Grail of Theater, with faded head-shots of such luminaries as Tallulah Bankhead, Alan Alda, Buddy Ebsen, Mae West, Treat Williams, Elaine Stritch, and many, many more - some whose faces are more familiar than their names, which are listed along with the plays they starred in at the Ivoryton Playhouse.

It probably isn’t accurate to call the Ivoryton Playhouse a community theater in the strictest sense, since some of the actors are professional; however, it is a fine combination of professional and amateur actors.

Their last regular season production for 2008 is the "The Rainmaker."

Written by N. Richard Nash, "The Rainmaker," ran on Broadway in 1954, and might be most familiar as the classic movie by the same name, starring Burt Lancaster and Hartford native Hepburn.


The play is set somewhere in the west on a cattle farm during a drought in August of some year in the middle of the last century.

A father, H.C. Curry, and his two sons, Jim and Noah Curry, pray for rain, as well as for a husband for H.C.’s daughter and the boy’s sister, Lizzie Curry.

It is set in a time when getting "hitched" was essential to a woman’s identity, in the view of society. At the time, if you were a woman and didn’t get married you were labeled a spinster and an old maid, and consequently, a failure.

Elizabeth Erwin plays Lizzie with just the right balance of intelligence and self-doubt. She gets all gussied up to have dinner with the town’s divorced deputy, File, sensitively played by Timothy Fannon, who doesn’t show. She lashes out in frustration and embarrassment to her father, saying: "I don’t want you to lasso me a husband."

H.C. is indulgent and caring with his children, and is played with palpable love and kindness by Larry Lewis. The younger and slower Jim is played with sweet effervescent energy by John Noel, while Danny Kirkwood plays the eldest brother, Noah, the exasperated, practical disbeliever of the family.

Into this family scene walks a fast talking con man named Starbuck who promises he can make it rain for $100, and so begins the dreamers and believers versus the practical realists.

"My method is like my name, all my own," exclaims Starbuck, played with a flood of energy and charisma by Colin Lane. He comes in like a tidal wave feeding the family full of the dreams and hopes they are all starving for.

Lane is just right for the role, but his Australian accent (or is it Irish?), which is barely detectable in the first act, blossoms in act two, while his western twang fades out more than in. Not that that matters too much, since it only accentuates his con artist persona.

David Cardone rounds out the cast as the observant and caring Sheriff.

The solid set by Dan Nischan is divided into thirds, with a sheriff’s office, barn, and the family’s living room. The costumes are all good, by costume designer Pam Puente, except Lizzie’s dressy dress looked like something that would be worn to a garden party today, and is too low cut for a modest gal like Lizzie.

The recorded musical interludes played between scenes are fine, except when the music starts before the scenes end, or worse still, plays in the middle of the love scene, when it is really distracting. In film it works, not so much in live theatre.

Perhaps it derives from watching award shows where the music kicks in when the actors’ acceptance speeches go on for too long, but here it is jarring, and takes away from what the actors were saying.

Those minor points aside, overall "The Rainmaker" is a touching, old-fashioned evening of heart-felt entertainment in a very special venue.


THE RAINMAKER

3 Stars
Location: Ivoryton Playhouse, 103 Main Street, Ivoryton, CT
Production: Written by N. Richard Nash. Directed by Julia Kiley. Stage manager Johanna K. Levai. Set design by Dan Nischan. Costumes by Pam Puente. Lighting designed by Tate R. Burmeister.
Running time: 2 hours with one intermission.
Show Times: Wednesday and Thursdays at 7:30 p.m., Friday and Saturdays at 8 p.m., with Wednesday and Sunday matinees at 2 p.m. through Nov. 16.
Tickets: $30 for adults, $25 for previews and seniors, $20 for students, and $15 for children 12 and under. Call the box office at 860-767-7318, or visit their website at www.ivorytonplayhouse.org.

ACTOR...CHARACTER
Elizabeth Erwin ... Lizzie Curry
Colin Lane ... Bill Starbuck
Timothy Fannon ... Deputy File
Danny Kirkwood ... Noah Curry
Larry Lewis ... H.C. Curry
John Noel ... Jim Curry
David Cardone ... Sheriff Thomas