'theatre review
‘Little Foxes’ chugs, but picks up speed
By MATT MEYER
OftoEmareM
Thursday night's opening of
the Carnival Theatre's produc
tion of The Little Foxes was
something like trying to take a
trip in a very old VW bug — hard
to get started, but fine once it's
up to speed
Act One was slow The
characters and necessary rela
tionships were established al
most immediately, but the in
troductions dragged on for the
better part of an hour
With all the southern accents,
cuts and howling, it was a little
like sitting through a marathon
screening of Carol Burnett s
‘‘American Family" sketches
Once the cast waded through
the first act, however, the play
shifted gears
George Lauris put on an ex
cellent performance as Horace
Giddens, the dying husband of
the domineering Regina Gid
dens (played by his real wife.
Priscilla Lauris)
Regina and her brothers
Beniamin (Robert Foster), Os
car (Gary Stevens) and Oscar s
son Leo (Dana Black) are
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members of the incredibly
greedy Hubbard family who live
to reap ill-gotten profits by ex
ploiting poor blacks
Horace seeks to save his
daughter Alexandra (Terri Lo
rang) from the greedy clutches
of the Hubbard family by foiling
his wife's plan for investing in a
mill that would bring millions to
the family and ruin to the town
Regina is a tiger when she
wants to be. and there's nothing
fiercer than a cornered feline
The resulting cat fight is in
credible
Little Foxes is all that a play
should be It covers the spec
trum of human emotions
The misery of Oscar s al
coholic wife Birdie (Mary
Gaither) brings tears to your
eyes The keenly timed wit of
Horace will make you laugh like
a child
Although the conniving avar
iciousness of the Hubbard fami
ly will fill you with disgust, the
good-hearted innocence of
Alexandra will restore your faith
in humanity
The acting was under
developed at worst and mag
nificent at best George Lauris
timing was impeccable, his
goodness not overstated and
his character weli-developed
Jerry Walker showed con
fidence and poise in his perfor
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George Lauris portrays the crippled husband of real-life wife
Priscilla Lauris in The Little Foxes
mance as mill-owner William
Marshall
Priscilla Lauris. though
adequate in her portrayal o* the
dominating Regina didn't
develop the softer feminine side
of the character The relation
ships between Regina and the
other members of the Hubbard
family could have been
Kinko’s
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developed more to bring out the
family ties
On the whole however, the
acting was extremely well done
The play was superb tech
nically as well The set, de
signed by Jerry Williams was a
realistic rendition of a turn-of
the-century southern house
complete with stained glass, oil
lamps and Victorian furniture
The set's only problem was a
lack of knick-knacks that char
acteristically clutter such a
house
The costumes also were well
done The use of color in the
ornate gowns — Regina's
gowns all were blood red — ad
ded to the show Birdie and
Alexandra appeared in light
colors and pastels
The second and third scenes
made up for the slow pacing of
the first All in all, Little Foxes
finished a winner
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