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Fa La La La La: the Holidays are Here! And at Footlights Theatre in Falmouth, Maine, they’re here Big Time, with a rich array of Holiday events every day, onstage, through December 23.
First up is The Gifts of Christmas, Michael J. Tobin’s heartwarming adaptation of O. Henry’s beloved story, Gift of the Magi, onstage now through December 23.
Tobin has set the tale in a small Maine town, so take your pick. The decade is the 1940’s, and the Very Special Day is—what else?—Christmas Eve.
Tobin, Footlights’ founder, CEO and Artistic Director, has applied his finely honed skills as playwright, set designer and director to every word, phrase, stage accent and plot twist of this production.
Della (played by Erin Leddy) sees Jim, an underpaid employee in a local bookstore (played by Ryan Lane), and is instantly and passionately attracted to him.
Jim’s boss (played by Bob Porzio) is a real taskmaster, mean to his employees and—if they don’t buy something—even his customers. When he walks in one day and sees hot, sizzling electricity— i. e., a budding romance—between Jim and Della, he orders Jim back to work and demands that Della either buy something or leave the store.
This doesn’t stop the two of them from falling deeply in love, however. And Della’s parents—especially her father—don’t approve. Why, they wonder, would their darling daughter ever be attracted to an underpaid nobody like Jim? And when Della reveals that she intends to marry Jim, the Bad Stuff Hits the Fan and Papa tells his daughter, if you choose Jim, you’ll no longer be welcome in our home!
Jim and the defiant Della go ahead and get married anyway, without the approval of her parents. And not only has Della’s relationship with them been fractured, the newlyweds are dirt poor and anguished over their inability to afford even one little gift to put under the tree for each other.
Within this all-too-familiar family melodrama—a story unto itself, always worth telling—is the equally compelling story of Jim and Della’s struggle to find a way to afford the gifts they want so badly to give each other on Christmas morning.
It’s how the two of them finally manage to come up with the gifts— and what the gifts actually are—that lies deep in the heart of this irresistible tale of two people desperately in love but penny poor and unable, materially, to express their affection for each other..
Leddy and Lane pull out all the stops in their roles as Della and Jim, emoting—sometimes to abandon, I think—with an intensity that the script alone might have reasonably conveyed. The work of delivering onstage emotions is best when shared equally—in harmonious balance—by the actors and the playwright.
Eliza Ruth Watson and Pam Mutty perform admirably and endearingly in their hilarious comedic cameo appearances. In their case, over-the-top line delivery makes good sense and enriches the performances.
Cheryl Reynolds does yeoman work as the narrator, skillfully weaving together the series of scenes and flashbacks that make it much easier for the audience to follow the play’s action.
On Opening Night, Mutty, in the highly nuanced role of Della’s mother, showed the audience her impressive range of emotions as an actor.
Bob Porzio, as Della’s mule-stubborn father, is almost too convincing as the classic Domineering Daddy, delivering his lines bombastically in a theatre space not really big enough to handle it. Once again, a character’s lines—not the roaring volume of those lines when delivered—should be enough, with a little help from the actor, to send the message of righteous anger from stage to audience.
Tobin’s set for this show is appropriately overflowing with the kinds of items we all enjoy displaying during the Holidays. A crackling fire, warm, intimate lighting, a delicate, steadily falling snow. Who can’t love a Holiday set like this one? Only a genuine, card-carrying curmudgeon!
Charlie Grindle, the longtime devoted musical veteran at Footlights, skillfully accompanies more than a dozen Holiday, cast-sung favorites woven cleverly into this production— everything from “I’ve Got My Love to Keep Me Warm” and “Winter Wonderland” to “Sleigh Ride” and “I’ll be Home for Christmas.”
In a country currently being forced to endure a day-by-day onslaught of political anger and voter disillusionment, Footlights Theatre’s production of “The Gifts of Christmas” is Just What the Doctor Ordered—and just what Tobin, as Falmouth’s devoted, gift-giving Theatrical Santa, has so thoughtfully put in your Christmas stocking this December. Come see the show, and have your spirits lifted to the Heavens!
Footlights Theatre, only minutes from downtown Portland, is at 190 US-1 in Falmouth, Maine. For tickets to The Gifts of Christmas—and for information about other Holiday-themed Footlights performances and special events—go to www.thefootlightstheatre.com or call the Footlights Box Office, 24/7, at (207) 747-5434.
-- Ross Alan Bachelder, 12/2/23