If Florida Studio Theater has staged a more riotous romp than Tom Jones, I haven’t seen it.
Author Mark Brown uses his nascent Narrator, the believable Graciany Miranda, in several additional “moving” roles in the action, particularly justifying the plot’s twists and turns. How Brown condenses a long picaresque novel into a two-hour play is a miracle of mirth into motion. (Changers of the sumptuous costumes by Jeni Schaefer should share a final curtain call with a director who’s also become a choreographer.)
Handsome, sweet Matthew Goodrich becomes the titled hero (or vice-versa) with two purposes: to be separated from his reputation as an illegitimate foundling and to be wed to much better-born Sophia (cute, sweet Faith Sandberg). They made me root for both, as well as for Sandberg as she changes into Irish woman Harriet with a gruff, unappreciative Squire husband (Ron Siebert, also formidable as a Highwayman, the scoundrel Black George but singularly sane Alworthy).
Tom’s big enemy is nasty cousin Blifil (Bruce Warren, a huffin’ and a puffin’), who wants to marry Sophie. He conspires with her father Squire Western (long-faced Howard Kaye, superbly stern) to disqualify Tom. If only faithfulness weren’t so difficult for Tom! Especially with so many women after him (among them Eileen Ward’s sexy servant Jenny Jones and Lisa McMilan’s oversexed old Lady Bellaston, when Lisa isn’t using a raw, raucous voice as some cagey doctor or squire). Perhaps the only non-lady who avoids wanting or shunning seduction is Bruce Warren doubling as Susan, a serving girl with big bouncing boobs.
I’d wondered how author Brown and director Shanahan might handle some of the memorable scenes from the movie, “Tom Jones.” Among the answers that come satisfactorily is the finding of baby Tom -- here in a stand-up bed. The famous eating as sexual foreplay takes place with use of a banana by Ward’s Jenny and a bunch of grapes held high and dropped into Tom’s mouth by Goodrich.
A simple columned set with simulated footlights, an important door on each side, and a passageway upstage becomes many places, thanks to lighting and props being whisked on and offstage.
Not everything about this production is silly, but even what is makes comic sense. Laughs, anyone? Go see FST’s Tom Jones.
