by Michele Markarian
“Last Night at Bowl-Mor Lanes” – Written by Weylin Symes. Directed by Bryn Boice. Presented by Greater Boston Stage Co., 395 Main Street, Stoneham, through September 29.
Full disclosure – this reviewer will get tickets to see Nancy E. Carroll, whose excellent acting never disappoints, in anything. Throw in the buoyant Paula Plum as scene partner, and you have an onstage chemistry that’s unbeatable, and undoubtedly the biggest reason to see “Last Night at Bowl-Mor”.
Audience members are immediately thrust into a sense of place with James J. Fenton’s incredible set, the interior of Bowl-Mor, a suburban bowling alley complete with a broken sign (the “M” dangles, upside down) and handwritten “CASH ONLY” sign on the cash register. So ingenious is its construction that the actresses – wait for it – actually bowl during the course of the 90-minute piece, no easy feat.
The play begins with a bowling alley break-in by Maude (Plum) and Ruth (Carroll). The Bowl-Mor has been sold to a developer, and Maude and Ruth, who have spent two nights a week on its lanes for the past forty some-odd years, are unwilling to let it go without one last match between them. On the surface, the friends appear to be very different – Maude is gregarious, daring, and Ruth more cautious, taciturn – but they share a competitive streak and a love for gossip and alcohol. They are not the only ones at the bowling alley that final night – owner Ed (Arthur Gomez) is there, in a back room, with a date (Ceit Zweil) who is not his wife, much to the concern of Maude and the outrage of Ruth.
Plum and Carroll shine in their roles, and with each other. Plum has a few choice lines at the beginning of the play of what it means to be old, and how liberating it is – “If we get caught we can just say we’re confused” – that she delivers with hilarious aplomb. Plum brings such a warmhearted, devil-may-care attitude to Maude that when, towards the end of the piece, she pays an emotional tribute to her late husband, it’s unexpectedly moving. Carroll, on the other hand, opens up more as her character drinks, revealing a much more tender-hearted and vulnerable Ruth. Always economical, Carroll is the master of subtext and intention. Gomez is a wonderful straight man to Plum’s Maude, listening with patience to her fantastical raves, and Zweil is utterly believable as Ruth’s daughter, imitating her mother in an uncanny way. Newcomer Isabella Tedesco, as Ruth’s granddaughter Teddy, makes a big impression in just a short scene. Director Boice keeps the action flowing.
What “Last Night at Bowl-Mor” sometimes lacks in verisimilitude – there is a tangent involving email that stretches the limit of credibility – it makes up for in warmth. Symes has constructed a world where community is first and foremost. Mothers keep an eye out for everyone’s children; friends bolster each other through troubled times. Maude and Ruth, despite being on the cusp of losing their bowling home, don’t hold it against Ed for selling to a Walmart. The care they display towards one another is nice to witness, particularly in today’s world where kindness seems to be a thing of the past. The audience is left at the end feeling as if, despite the closing of the alley, Ruth, Maude and their families are all going to be fine. Which in itself is a good enough reason to see the show. For tickets and information, go to: www.greaterbostonstage.org
