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You Can't Take It With You
by Pinnacle High School Theatre
No matter how much you love your family, chances are you’ve
found them embarrassing once or twice. Or a couple thousand times. Alice
Sycamore’s family is the embarrassing family that everyone would love to have –
a fun, eccentric lot who does whatever they please no matter the amount of
money or odd looks they may generate. And they’ve been generating such things
since Moss Heart and George Kaufman penned this Pulitzer- and Oscar-winning
comedy in 1936. More than 70 years later, Pinnacle High School staged it under
their new director Toni Fioramonti – a lively production with good
energy and laughs throughout.
At the center of the story are the young couple who smash
together two very different types of families. Hania Grosz is a sweet,
happy, and excited Alice Sycamore. Her new boyfriend is Tony Kirby, the son of
a business tycoon, who is played by the genuinely affable Michael Beckwith.
Tony immediately falls in love with Alice’s quirky family, but how are his
rich, prudish, snobby parental units going to feel about them?
The quirky family is led by its likeable, easygoing
patriarch Grandpa Vanderhof. Dalton Williams does a nice job in the role
and uses his speaking voice very well to help create the character. Penny
Sycamore is his daughter and Alice’s mother, with Lindsey Stegemoller
delighting as she uses her cheery, cutesy voice and demeanor no matter whether
she’s talking about new romance or the poison gas in her war play (Penny took
up playwriting because someone delivered a typewriter to the house by mistake).
Katie Shelton plays Alice’s dance-happy sister Essie Carmichael, with
Katie delivering a funny and bubbly Essie who is always dancing badly with
flair and enthusiasm and skill (a trained dancer pretending to be a bad
dancer), and she’s always clearly and totally in love with her amateur
musician/candy salesman husband Ed (Austin Rickert).
Of course, they all clash rather badly with Tony’s
parents. Rachel Hill is an amusingly snobby Mrs. Kirby and Mitch
Florez is a straight-laced Mr. Kirby trying to be polite. Testing that
politeness is family friend and Essie’s dance instructor Boris Kolenkhov, with Tony
Freitas as a melodramatic Russian who teaches Mr. Kirby how to wrestle. Kylie
Ceraolo is their drunken guest Gay Wellington whom they try to hide from
the Kirbys by throwing a rug over her (but she wakes up and begins doing a
not-so-prudish dance on the dining table). Not to mention the big-haired,
big-bellied Mr. DePina, with actor Morgan Wiseman creating an original
character full of surprises that includes him being easily startled by
anything, dressing as an ancient Greek super hero as he poses as a discus
thrower for a portrait (and then thrashing the easel when trying to make a
hasty departure for the Kirbys), and trying hard to flirt with Duchess Olga
(Colleen Fry). This flirting is to the displeasure of Kolenkhov who
eventually entices DePina into the kitchen and shuts the door on him. Proof
that there’s bound to be conflict, even in the funnest of families.
Performs November 13 - 15, 2008.
Rob Hopper
National Youth Theatre
~ Cast ~
Penny Sycamore: Lindsey Stegemoller
Essie Carmichael: Katie Shelton
Rheba: Brooke Atkins
Paul Sycamore: Timothy Olsen
Mr. DePina: Morgan Wiseman
Ed Carmichael: Austin Rickert
Donald: Jordan Clarke
Grandpa: Dalton Williams
Alice Sycamore: Hania Grosz
Henderson: Tori Bottiglieri
Tony Kirby: Michael Beckwith
Boris Koenkhov: Tony Freitas
Gay Wellington: Kylie Ceraolo
Mr. Kirby: Mitch Florez
Mrs. Kirby: Rachel Hill
Man #1: Hayden Montgomery
Man #2: Sarah Johnson
Man #3: Cloudia Darling
Olga Katrain: Colleen Fry
Director: Toni Fioramonti
Stage Manager: Jordyn West
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