If you traveled in the States prior to the 60s, you probably stayed at small roadside motel quite similar to the Bluebonnet Court. If it had a neon sign, it wasn't working properly. You could pull your car up next to your cabin. You may have even met a Lila Jean Webb or Roy Glen Webb. Welcome to playwright Zsa Zsa Gershick's Austin, Texas, circa spring of 1944.
Helen Burke (Wendy Waddell), New Yorker, Jewish, young and attractive, has met car trouble. She's stuck in one of the units of the Bluebonnet Court. Lila Jean (Jo Anne Glover) runs the motel. She is also trying to keep her damaged war-vet husband, Roy Glenn (Christopher Buess), from going over the edge and staying constantly drunk. Helen has entered a twilight zone. Roy Glen is mentally battered from the war, he's a racist, anti-Semitic, and can't even relate to his wife except through anger and physical abuse. Lila Jean is the perfect Texas hostess filled with southern hospitality and a gracious smile, all of which are hiding the pain of an uncaring, damaged husband and the desire for just a smidgen of love.
Playwright Gershick fearlessly creates characters who examine their own sexuality and their relationship to race and ethnicity, and they experience the vast cultural differences created by geography and color. She contrasts clipped New York speak with Texas drawl, Yiddish with southern slang, northern ethos with southern and black ethos, and so much more. The clash of cultures is fascinating to watch unfold on Diversionary's stage.
The motel maid, Orla Mae Bird (Monique Gaffney) is the proper black servant, saying nothing, always doing the bidding of her employer. She is so much more. She is self-educated, well-read and interested in more than backwater Austin has to offer. There is also an electricity between her and Helen. The contrast is astounding and and lovely. Gaffney portrays the two sides of Orla Mae to perfection.
Leigh Scarritt plays the tragic Nanalu Branch. Nanalu plays life fast and loose and boldly goes where disaster is sure to happen. A friend of Orla Mae, they advise each other, though Nanalu doesn't abide by good advice. She is a sight in her high, high heels and a drunken state.
The playwright offers a wonderful contrasting commentary, usually relegated to a soundtrack of live-style radio. Lisa Gorell-Getz and Fred Harlow provide on-onstage radio commentary as the actors search the dial for radio solace. They are pitch artists, radio preachers, storytellers, and much more in a delightful artifice works well. Pre-show and intermission offers canned radio from the period - a nice touch.
In this serious drama with many hilarious scenes, director Delicia Turner Sonnenberg has cast well and directed with just the right touch. Each of the cast know their character well. Waddell, with the most subtle role, creates a persona we can easily relate to.
Bluebonnet Court deftly explores some explosive issues and is well worth serious consideration.
