Vermont Stage’s ‘Well’ serious and seriously funny

Jim Lowe Staff Writer

BURLINGTON — Lisa Kron’s “Well” starts out as a somewhat silly comedy but soon turns into a serious drama because it’s real.

Vermont Stage Company opened its 15th season of professional theater in Burlington last week with a production of this funny, endearing memoir.

Kron’s autobiographical play is ostensibly about illness and integration, both racial and personal, but ultimately it’s about coming to grips with oneself. Isn’t that what all theater of any consequence is all about?

The play opens with Lisa announcing her intention to begin a theatrical exploration of illness and how some people get well and others don’t. Her immediate complication is that her invalid mother, Ann, is right there, sitting in her bed slippers in her La-Z-Boy, questioning her daughter every step of the way.

Lisa grew up as a member of a Jewish family in the first racially integrated neighborhood in Lansing, Mich. She tells the story of her childhood there. The immediate focus is on the allergies that her mother claims brought her down and Ann’s own fight with those allergies, which she seems to have won.

Much of Ann’s childhood is told with the addition of cartoon-like characters, including friends and memories, as well as fellow patients at a Chicago allergy clinic that Lisa attended while in college. But, it is when, finally, they represent the actors that Lisa has hired for her “theatrical exploration” that this play becomes truly compelling.

At Thursday’s preview performance, Vermont Stage Company’s production took a little while to take off, but when it did, it was riveting and ultimately rewarding. Now in residence in the Flynn Center’s FlynnSpace, the company is entering its 15th season of professional theater in the Burlington area.

Directed by Jim Gaylord, the production is largely dependent upon two characters, Lisa and her mother, Ann, and the Vermont Stage production benefits from two particularly fine actresses. Lisa Barnes looked and sounded like the part of Lisa, a young, smart and sure-of-herself suburban Jewish woman, but it took a little time before she was comfortable enough to be convincing. Ann, played by Dale Soules, also took a little time to sound authentic. But once they got going, it proved a wonderfully contentious — albeit fun — ride to the end.

Most successful was the two actresses playing on each other. Therein was the real drama and comedy — and you couldn’t help but relate to both.

The actors playing the other roles — Chris Caswell, Edgar Davis, Winnie Looby and Jason Lorber — were entertaining in their cartoon-like characters and successfully serious in certain moments. The scene and costume design by Jenny Fulton was attractive, but the staging seemed occasionally awkward in the intimate FlynnSpace.

“Well” is a compelling and entertaining opener for Vermont Stage’s 15th season.