‘The Housekeeper’

Off-Broadstreet Theatre in Hopewell succeeds with yet another overlooked work.

By: Stuart Duncan

Catherine Rowe and Michael Gallagher star in The Housekeeper.

   Bob and Julie Thick manage to find projects for Off-Broadstreet Theatre in Hopewell, that other venues, not only in the area but around the country, seem to overlook.
   The summer months saw Hotel d’Amour, an offbeat musical based on a French bedroom farce a century old. The writer was so excited by reports of the work’s success that he showed up for a performance, found that it explored territory he had never seen before and vowed to do some rewriting.
   The latest find is The Housekeeper, a quirky little valentine written almost 20 years ago by James Prideaux, who has had small fame for Broadway, off-Broadway, television and book credits. He seems to be best known for writing TV roles for Katharine Hepburn and then penning a book about that.
   The plot revolves around a fuddy-duddy bachelor, Manley Carstairs, who has just buried his beloved mother, still chats with her and hasn’t ventured from his house on the edge of town for years — and Annie Dankworth, a semi-bag lady who answers an ad for a housekeeper and proceeds to create chaos out of confusion.
   In less capable hands, the evening at Off-Broadstreet would be little more than an overwritten, understocked batch of silly plot twists, laced with innuendoes and peppered with ill-matching alliterations. But when director Bob Thick has picked such clever actors as Catherine Rowe and Michael Gallagher, each able to whack a comedy line to the back walls, then plunge deep within the soul, the evening quickly works its way past sitcom to real comedy and beyond.
   Much of the time the pair accomplish this despite playwright Prideaux, who insists on creating phrases that sound delicious but have precious little content. Manley insists his philosophy is "to never trust a truffle." Anne describes her elegant chocolate dessert as "porcupine poop." Another situation is described as "a cesspool of sham." Mr. Gallagher and Ms. Rowe blithely push past these tongue-twisters to find real moments of reality.
   Director Thick clearly has encouraged his pair to ride the thin edge of laughter, both physical and verbal as the evening unfolds. The result is a work that gets better and stronger, and eventually captures you completely, doing it so cleverly you hardly know you have been manipulated. Thus, a work that others have dismissed for years becomes a warm-and-fuzzy charmer.
The Housekeeper continues at Off-Broadstreet Theatre, 5 S. Greenwood Ave., Hopewell, through Oct. 12. Performances: Fri.-Sat. 8 p.m.; Sun. 2:30 p.m. Tickets cost $22.50-$24. For information, call (609) 466-2766.<</i>br>