THEATER REVIEW

By The BROTHERS BARRYMORE

Our love of fine theater is well documented. My brother Lionel and I search high and low for talented thespians honing their skills on Shakespeare, Chekhov, Tennessee Williams and the like. Theater is in our blood, and that blood, as you surely are aware, flows blue.

Our travels this week bring us, unfortunately, to Hiawatha Elementary School's 4th grade production of "Stone Soup."

Let us begin with the best part of the play, it was, thankfully, one performance only.

A more hideous display I cannot recall. The abysmal costumes and deplorable set designs looked as if they were all home-made.

Could this possibly be true in this day and age?

This dreadful production performed by a group of untalented and immature actors was akin to eating rancid leftovers from a truckstop dumpster.

The performance took place in the school's cafeteria.

Yes, you read that correctly, the school's cafeteria, under flourescent lights no less.

The audience was forced to sit on cold, hard metal folding chairs, which were haphazardly strewn around the room. What an unprofessional way to treat a paying audience!

Well, my brother is being exceedingly kind in his assessment of this performance. My review can be summed up in one word. C-R-A-P.

I can't remember spending a worse evening in all my life.

"Stone Soup"? What a ridiculous name for a play! I thought this was going to be one of those avant-garde Sam Shepard plays. Boy was I mistaken. This slop sounded like it had been written by a mentally challenged ten year old. Stone Soup indeed.

The male lead actor, let me read my amateurish program here, one Zach Bergstein, couldn't stop sniffling and wiping his nose on his sleeve. I was enraged! I was ready to drag him off stage by his hair and scrape that running nose on the sidewalk outside.

The entire cast was awful. Unprepared. Unconvincing.

The audience was full of moronic turds, clapping and whistling incessantly. One beastly woman sitting next to me stood up and clapped each time one particular little boy appeared on stage. She would then plop into her chair, her massive thighs banging into me, and would turn to me and say, "That's my Brandon." This went on a few times until I could take no more. I took my cane with the brass handle and rapped her twice over the head, drawing blood and knocking her unconscious. I have my limits you know.

My brother tends to get a bit dramatic at times, which is completely understandable in a family such as ours. I've had to pay off numerous theater goers over the years from calling the authorities on Lionel, especially when he gets overly physical.

I folded up a fifty and placed it in the woman's coat pocket and wrapped my pocket handkerchief over her head wound, it was dark, no one noticed.



Please don't make excuses for me, dear brother, I am fully responsible for my own behavior. Let's get through this damn review already so I can drink my double scotch.

This shabby production proceeded without an intermission.

WITHOUT AN INTERMISSION!!

Unheard of! Classless pigs!

When the lights finally turned back on (thankfully right after I retrieved the fifty my foolhardy brother placed in that sow's coat pocket) the theater erupted in applause, as everyone, save John and I, stood up and cheered. Cheers? Applause? If I had access to rotten fruit I would have hurled it at these talentless hacks!

In the back of the room was a table full of aluminum tins, containing what looked like home-made cookies, brownies, and powdered sugar coated bundt cakes. These putrid little actors bounded off stage and made a bee line right for these unsavory "treats".

John and I couldn't get out of that building fast enough.

Lionel and I disagree on a great many things: how long to make love to a woman; which hair pomade works best under hot lights; when to stare dramatically past your co-star to convey inner turmoil, but we are in total agreement on this matter. This performance was horrendous.

If you find yourself driving past Hiawatha Elementary School on 'Play Night', pin your accelerator to the floor and keep driving, you'll thank me.

(Next time the brothers will review Celebrity Cruise Line's production of Urinetown) DD