by Joel Elkins~

The Girl Who Would Be Kingis a fairy tale about “Basil,” a girl raised as a boy by her power-hungry father, the Duke of Lesser Flugel, in the hope that she could one day ascend to the throne of the patrilineal Kingdom of Flugelhorn. She is raised to be proud of her “manhood” and to look down upon the weaker sex. The story is narrated onstage by the Story Teller, portrayed wonderfully by Shelley Delayne, and acted out in a sort of slapstick, tongue-in-cheek comedic style.

Actually, and this is not often said, one of the most impressive aspects of the play was the lighting by Sasha A. Venola, which cast a professional glow on the entire production. Add to that Delayne’s beautifully simple set design, and the audience begins to expect great things even before the first actor sets foot on stage. However, the entry of the cast en masse to begin Act I first portends that something is not quite right in the state of Flugelhorn. They are all appropriately clad in classical medieval, fairy tale-ish costumes. However, it is clearly evident that many are wearing jeans and other street clothes under their tunics and robes. Perhaps this was a conscience decision by director Richard Tatum and costume designer Beth Arford – To give the impression of the performance of a story rather than the semblance of real life? To emphasize that, although the action takes place in a fictitious kingdom, the prevailing attitudes at issue continue to lurk beneath the surface today? I don’t know – but the result just seems sloppy.

The acting ranges from okay to very good. Riley Rose Critchlow delivers a worthy performance in the lead role, but Whitton Frank steals the show with an absolutely picture-perfect performance as the beautiful and genteel Princess Clotilda. She looks and plays the part flawlessly, and even garners the biggest laughs while still managing to stay in character throughout. Showing that there are no small parts, Adriana Bate also excels in the role of Basil’s mother, the Duchess of Lesser Flugel. A lovely staging device has all the actors seated towards the back of the stage while not performing, either towards the audience and admiring the action taking place before them or with their backs to the audience, providing the sound effects.

However, the production could have taken a lesson from its own script. (Bear with me for one moment on this stretch of an analogy, because in the end I think it works.) Like Basil, who is in essence a girl but raised as a boy to enable her to become king in a society only open to male rulers, so too this production, though in its nature a charming one-act, is stretched to its limits to become a full two-act so that it could achieve stage-hood under some misguided notion that one-acts cannot get produced. As a result, virtually every line and action is accompanied by unnecessary, convoluted, and sometimes disruptive attempts by the director and performers to squeeze one more laugh out of the script, with the result that this poor script, through no fault of its own, is left utterly wrung out. I would have much rather seen all the enjoyable aspects of this play condensed into a shorter but cleaner one-act (either by itself or perhaps in conjunction with another one-act expanding on the theme). Ah, ‘twould theatre but learn the lessons of Frugelhorn!

That being said, the play is not without laughs. Indeed, at times, I couldn’t help myself from chuckling aloud. However, for every funny line, there were one or two that simply fell flat. The beauty of fairy tales, after all, lies in their simplicity.

The Girl Who Would Be King is performed Fridays and Saturdays at 8 pm and Sundays at 2 pm through August 1, 2010.

The El Centro Theater is located at 800 N. El Centro Ave. in Hollywood (one block east of Vine between Melrose and Santa Monica).

Ticket prices: $20.00

Reservations online at www.absolutetheatrela.org/buy-tickets or by phone at (323) 230-7261.