Eclectic Full Contact Theater Presents FUDDY MEERS Review –An Unforgettable Time With A Forgetful Person

To Grandmother’s House We Go

From the first moment of the play it’s obvious that Director Katherine Siegel, and her cast, came to play. Claire (Lisa Savegnago) wakes up and is told by her husband, Richard (Joe Cattoggio), that she has a specific kind of amnesia which leads her to forget everything once she goes to sleep. From this scenario hilariousness ensues for almost two hours as she discovers she’s married and has a teenage son, Kenny (Frank Gasparro - who is a quiet but effective scene stealer), and is then kidnapped by the Limping Man (Andrew Pond) who happens to be partially deaf, blind in one eye, and is sporting some serious facial injuries that allude to there being more to this story. The first act is very high energy, but everyone on stage seems up to the task. Between laughs you find yourself amused with the company’s solutions to getting props on and off stage.  Hint: it requires a lot of eye hand coordination to “fly” props in and out of the space.

By the time all of the characters make it into the same room it’s clear that this play will not have a nice and neat ending, but will instead end as messily, and as quickly, as it began. By the time we make it to Gert’s house, and realize the way she says “funny mirrors” is where the name of the play comes from, it feels like most of the audience is invested in this weird tale even if it’s not obvious where this is all going to end up. While the script’s second act isn’t as solid as the first act, in this writers’ view, the cast seems to continue to navigate the twists, turns, and backstabbing with a delightful amount of glee. The commitment to these over the top characters, in this highly absurd situation, seems to this writer worth the price of admission alone.