Aral Gribble, Arthur
Beer and Aaron Moore

in a scene from JET's
production of Oy!

-01.11110 L- 17.--- t - 1

-

I ,

Comedy Vignettes

JET ends season with an Oy!

Ronelle Grier
Special to the Jewish News

T

he current JET season goes out
not with a bang, but with an
Oy!, a lighthearted collection
of 12 sketches directed by Mary Bremer
and performed by a five-member
ensemble cast.
Oy! was written by New Yorker
Richard Orloff, whose style of humor is
marked by unconventional
takes on traditional ideas.
One is a courtroom scene
where Laurel Hufano plays
a human being asking for a divorce
from God, played by Aaron Moore
resplendent in a dazzling gold-lame
jogging suit. In "Good News',' Arthur
Beer plays a frustrated Albert Einstein
who calls his mother, played by Rochelle
Rosenthal, to tell her he has won the
Nobel Prize. Instead of kudos, he
receives criticism about his messy hair.
One of the funniest moments is the
title sketch, where the towel-clad male
cast members communicate for the
entire scene using various nuances of
only one word: Oy.
A highlight of the production is "A
Trolley Named Tsuris," a three-act play
by "Tennessee Williamsburg." When
the undershirt-clad Stanley Kowalski,
played by Moore, thinks his precious
Stella (Hufano) has left him, he gets
down on his knees and gives forth a bel-

low even Brando would have admired.
Rosenthal is hilarious in the role of
Rhoda, the next-door yenta who tries
to convert her neighbors to the ways of
Jewish cooking and shopping.
"Have you ever picked something
up and said, have no idea what this is
for, but it's cute?"' asks Rhoda. "That's a
chatchke."
The play moves at an energetic pace,
and scene changes are cleverly handled
with the use of a projector
and large screen that displays
the title of each sketch along
with the definitions of various
Yiddish words.
Leah Karper's creative costume
designs give each sketch its own person-
ality and allow the actors to believably
assume a variety of roles. Most memo-
rable are Gribble and Hufano as Adam
and Eve, complete with Lycra birthday
suits, fig leaves and one strategically
placed carrot.
At a time when the political and
economic climate has all of us a little
fertummeled (confused), Oy! provides
some welcome comic relief and a fitting
finale to the 2007-2008 JET season. El

Fivigrtd isi

Johnny Trudell

accompanied

with his 20 piece orchestra

In commemoration to the day one of the greatest
entertainers of all time died 10 years ago

REV IEW

Tickets are $39 & $49

l

A

May 4

A Tribute to

Frank Sinatra

Frank Sinatra was one of the most iconic

entertainers of the 20th century, with hits

like "My Way': "Fly Me To The Moon",

"Luck Be A Lady", "New York New York"

Oy! runs through May 25 at
the Jewish Community Center
in West Bloomfield. $33-$39;
discounts available. Information
and tickets: (248) 788-2900.

and so many more long-time favorites.

10 years to-the-day of Frank Sinatra's

death, Mark Randisi will be performing

these and more of Sinatra's greatest

hits, accompanied by the smooth sound

ships with men.
First, April meets
Ben (Matthew
Broderick), a
Jewish teacher,
and they marry
in a Jewish cer-
emony. Ben turns
Elinor Lipman
out to be boyishly
immature, and
he dumps April after a few months.
April, however, finds out that she is
pregnant with Ben's child shortly
after the breakup. Then she meets
Frank, a non-Jewish guy and the
divorced father of three (Colin Firth).
Frank isn't perfect by any means,
but he and April, in fits and starts,
build a good relationship. In the film,
actor Ben Shenkman plays April's

brother.
The film actually emphasizes
April's Jewishness more than the
novel (with which Hunt takes great
liberties in her screenplay), with
religious observance being a key
part of April's life. Hunt says, "They
are Jewish in the book. Why would
I change that? In the novel, the
protagonist's adoptive parents are
Holocaust survivors ... and it's a
comedy. I've grown up with Jewish
humor all around me. If you want
to make the film funnier, you don't
make the family Presbyterians."
Hunt grew up with Jewish humor
because her father, Gordon Hunt, is
a Hollywood-based TV acting coach
and director whose late mother was
Jewish.

of Johnny Trudell with his 20 piece

orchestra!

Francis Albert Sinatra
Dec. 12, 1915 - May 14, 1998

"Old Blue Eyes"

ANDIAMO CELEBRITY SHOWROOM

7096 East 14 Mile Road just west of Van Dyke in Warren

TICKETS AND EVENT INFORMATION:

Andiamo Celebrity Showroom

(586) 268-3200

www.andiamoshowroom.com

Ticketmaster

(248) 645-6666

www.ticketmaster.com

ticketmaster

1384600

May B e 2008

B11