Some Holiday Fare Is Fairer Than Others—and Funnier

Comments (0) By Elaine Liner Thursday, Dec 11 2008

Directed by Rene Moreno, with clever choreography by Sara J. Romersberger, and onstage accompaniment by handsome pianist James McQuillen, Closer Than Ever is close to perfect.

That one-man It's a Wonderful Life at WaterTower Theatre is written by Steve Murray and titled This Wonderful Life. Greg White, a theater prof at Texas State University, re-enacts the 1946 Frank Capra film, playing all the roles.

George Wada

Same pixie shoes, different stage: Nye Cooper brings David Sedaris' The Santaland Diaries to Contemporary Theatre of Dallas.

Details

The Santaland Diaries and Closer Than Ever continue through December 28 at Contemporary Theatre of Dallas. Call 214-828-0094.

The Ruby Sunrise continues through December 14 at Collin College Theatre Center, Plano. Call 972-881-5809.

This Wonderful Life continues through December 21 at WaterTower Theatre, Addison. Call 962-450-6232.

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The question is, why? Murray makes no comment on the movie, a story of a small-town good guy named George Bailey losing and finding his soul on a snowy Christmas Eve. TWL isn't a send-up, a putdown or really a play. It's one sweaty actor doing lots of voices, none of them sounding a ga-ga-gol-durn like the movie's star, Jimmy Stewart. White wheezes, stutters and sputters through the 90-minute performance, confusing character names and stumbling on lines and over the cluttered set.

A one-man Godfather might be fun. Or a one-woman Mommie Dearest. But this one? Mute all bells. No wings awarded.

The Ruby Sunrise at Collin College Theatre Center doesn't let facts get in the way of TV history. Rinne Groff's play opens with a runaway teen (Christin Felts) inventing a crude cathode ray tube in an Indiana barn in 1927, but it's too late to beat actual inventors Philo T. Farnsworth and Vladimir Zworykin to patent rights. The action jumps to the '50s, the heyday of live TV dramas, as a plucky "script girl" (Bailey Frankenberg) fights for story credit. After that, the plot spins out to diatribes about blacklisting in the Red Scare.

As always, Collin College produces at pro level, with strong turns by the student cast, particularly by an actress credited as Tomorrow (no last name), playing dual roles as a slatternly farm gal and a snooty TV actress. She has such a crazy-cool Kathleen Turner vibe, it's like she's acting in living color and everyone else is in black and white.