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| Killer
Queens: (l-r) May, Hart and Delaney of Capital Rep’s
The Smell of the Kill. |
Sharp
as Wives
By James Yeara
The
Smell of the Kill
By
Michele Lowe, directed by Maggie Mancinelli-Cahill
Capital
Repertory Theatre, through May 7
Any comedy that features attractive women stripping or stripped
to their frilly teddies or camisoles had better have more
going for it than titillation. Any comedy that has upper-class,
happily married wives leaving their husband to freeze to death
in an expensive meat locker, literally locking the men in
their boxes to turn frigid with the other dead meat of hunted
animals, had better have more levels to it than just shlocky
symbolism.
Thankfully, The Smell of the Kill isn’t just any comedy,
and the curiously thought-provoking play is more fun than
just simple light farce. This is as good a show as Capital
Repertory Theatre’s I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change,
and every bit as funny, trenchant and well-directed. And at
75 minutes with no intermission, the laughs come quick, long,
hard, and frequent, and that is something to be glad for.
The
Smell of the Kill is suddenly everywhere since its
1999 inception at Cleveland Public Theater. After playing
at Berkshire Theatre Festival last summer, it’s playing currently
at the Helen Hayes Theater in Manhattan with the same BTF
director and the star (Claudia Shear) of the BTF cast. It’s
tempting to state, “Why see an imitation here when you can
see it on Broadway?”
But Capital Repertory’s production features three rich performances
that squeeze all the laughs out of the material, and a bit
of humanity that might go overlooked elsewhere. A play about
hoisting a bully by his own petard is rich in irony, and while
the plot—killing husbands who have no redeeming qualities
other than money (and they each lose that, leading to the
thought a man is what he earns)—smacks of the worst sort of
sexism, Capital Rep’s The Smell of the Kill is made
surprisingly empathetic. I wanted these murderers to get away
with it, and their little dance of joy to “Girls Just Want
to Have Fun” shows the thoughtful hand on the director’s clapboard
here.
No one goes to a comedy for the plot, and The Smell of
the Kill’s is silly. Three wealthy wives, Nicky (Corinna
May), Molly (Shelley Delaney), and Debra (Pamela Hart in the
Claudia Shear role), meet with their respective mates in Nicky’s
expensive home for their monthly expensive group meal—and
their expensive lives implode. The men play golf in the living
room while the women clear up and kvetch in the kitchen, interrupted
by the men throwing their balls into the room. The women end
up partially disrobing to reveal how truly goofy lingerie
looks, and eventually vote to let their husband freeze to
death in the expensive meat locker Nicky’s husband has installed
to freeze his hunting kills.
The plot doesn’t read promising, but it plays well.
The three actresses amaze. Each has moments that make you
laugh so hard Capital Rep will have to Scotchgard the seats.
Hart, as the buxom Debra, plays the transformation from earth
mother to wounded tigress with a glee that’s palpable.
Delaney delights as Molly, the airhead with the thoughts of
gold. The star of Capital Rep’s previous stellar Dancing
at Lughnasa and Sylvia, Delaney has a focus that
allows her to snap her non sequiturs off with a breathtaking
and exact clarity. She makes Molly’s journey more than just
a series of I Love Lucy miscues with an avant-garde
edge. Delaney’s gamine charms deserve raves; her Molly is
a glass of bubbly crossed with a fortune cookie’s wisdom.
Delaney’s talent makes Molly a person, not just a collection
of comedic devices.
As for Corinna May’s Nicky, a joke often heard at May’s usual
haunts Shakespeare & Company is that every review includes
“and as (fill in character’s name) the lovely Corinna May.”
May is lovely as Nicky, all icy blonde trophy wife, but May
creates a Nicky whose rage, hurt, humiliation and longing
are as real as the laughter. She goes far beyond the ambition
and ego of the typical trophy wife gone bad. May’s focus follows
Nicky’s tracks as surely as her husband did on the hunt. It’s
a role in a play May would have never have had at Shakespeare
& Company, and Capital Rep should be lauded for that,
too.
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