“Bashert” is a traditional Jewish word whose meaning developed into the idea, according to Lynne Bernfield, of “mingling despite Fate.” Or maybe because of it, depending on the points of view of others as well as Lynne’s. In her new solo show, she mostly explores the bashert she has experienced in life but secondarily how it worked earlier in her family. Outlining its history on a white board, Lynne prepared for a story, based on religious belief, of a “marriage made in heaven.” Bashert, Lynne celebrates in song, influenced the life of her parents, wed for 60 years. Did it affect her two siblings? Turning to her own experience, she sings “Someone Stands Out” about the first time she saw the man she would marry. Afterward, the “world changed forever” for her, as did her residence. In Los Angeles she questioned her life when she realized she might have written the book, “Women Who Love Too Much.” Onstage in Sarasota, Lynne concentrated on love in story and song, moving, and gesturing cabaret-style to her audience. She defends anyone but especially a certain three, who’d worked in soap operas that “legitimate theater people rated low.” Her smile is infectious when she announces that two of her three soap-opera friends became stars. The third sort of disappeared from her life. “It’s Just Coincidence” Lynne sings about meeting up with a man whose life she had saved years earlier when they were on an airplane. Though she moved to Sarasota, she often spent spurts of time back in L.A. She’s made a related CD. No, it isn’t for sale after her performance, but from her audience’s spontaneous clapping during her final song, I’d say any recording she’s made could have been a sell-out. For an encore on demand, Lynne Bernfield told a story of visiting Manhattan and meeting there, unplanned, one of the three men she’d known in L.A. On a TV screen she watched him picking up Emmys. She’d finally met up with him again. Bashert??? This is the second play Lynne Bernfield has created and performed at SaraSolo. It seems to be evolving. Her outline might be better seen written in white or yellow on a bigger board, like a traditional black or green one.
