By Michael Dresdner
 |
| L to R, Nicole Locket, Gabriel McClellend, Jenifer Rifenbery |
A few minutes in, rumbling sound effects and a piercing
scream let you know right off the bat that this will be a mystery thriller. Night Watch, a Lucille Fletcher play
with decided Hitchcock overtones, has shown up at Tacoma Little Theatre just in time for Halloween.
The scream comes from wealthy heiress Elaine (Nicole Locket),
who’s seen a bloody dead body in a chair through a briefly raised shade on the
window of a vacant building across the way. No one else in the house sees
anything; not her husband John (Gabriel McClellend), her visiting best friend
Blanche (Jenifer Rifenbery), or the housekeeper Helga (Ziggy Devlan).
To complicate matters, Elaine is an emotionally fragile
insomniac whose first husband, whom she says the aforementioned dead body
resembled, died in a car wreck along with his illicit paramour. As is usually the
case in this story genre, the police find no evidence of anything having
happened, so by the time she sees a second body there, one resembling the
blonde paramour, everyone, audience included, is starting to doubt her sanity.
As odd evidence mounts, like a blonde wig and a local who
also looks like the dead man, we’re left wondering if she’s crazy, or is being
played by her assumed friend and husband. Before long, her husband, aided by a
psychiatrist who makes house calls, has convinced her to go to a mental
hospital in Europe.
Through a sizeable chunk of both acts, the play lurches
clumsily along like a sloppy jalopy with various secondary characters wandering
through. Some will be key to the plot, but others seem merely to distract or
add comic relief. Be patient, though, for ultimately the conclusion arrives
with a very surprising twist that, while some might find a bit unsettling, I
found to be quite satisfying.
Whether by accident, design, or direction, Locket and
McClellend, both very skilled actors who’ve done superb and finely nuanced
performances in the past, come off a bit two dimensional in this outing. That
distracts from the inexorable building of tension that should be more gripping
than it is. Rifenbery, by contrast, is quite convincing in a pleasantly
understated performance as Elaine’s two-faced best friend.
John Pfaffe, a consistently reliable and skillful actor,
plays the trench-coated police lieutenant Walker to a tee. Even more delightful
is the flamboyant neighbor Appleby, played by another theatre mainstay, Joe
Grant. He’s so compelling and likable that I wished he had more stage time.
The set, designed by Burton Yuen with props and set dressing
by Becca Heines, deserves its own accolades. There’s obvious wealth behind the
spare, modern 1970’s NYC apartment, which includes a perspective painted checkerboard
floor, fine art on the walls, a Caldor mobile, an Eames chair, and a Mondrian
inspired back wall skinned with a semi-transparent scrim. Throughout the play, the
wall morphs and pulsates with a wide range of colors and lighting effects
(Niclas R. Olson), adding both visual pleasure and mood.
Adding to the pleasant setting were the costumes (Francis
Rankos), especially the iconic ones on Blanche and the hilariously outré ones worn
by Appleby. The aforementioned sound effects (Joe Kelly) included eerie songs,
street sounds, and the rest of the needed stage noises that bring realism to
theatre.
If for you, October is just not complete without a foray
into the eerie, you should add this play to your to Halloween to-do list.
Night Watch
Oct. 19 to Nov. 11,
2012
Tacoma Little Theatre
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