Theatre in Review: Casa Valentina (Manhattan Theatre Club/Samuel J. Friedman Theatre)

	Nick Westrate and John Cullum. Photo: Mathew Murphy

Given Broadway's current mania for stars, it's interesting that so many of the season's plays have been large ensemble efforts. Denzel Washington is only one among equals in A Raisin in the Sun and Bryan Cranston is backed by a phalanx of top character actors in All the Way. The past week has seen John Steinbeck's brace of field hands in Of Mice and Men and the cracked residents of a remote Irish island in Martin McDonagh's The Cripple of Inishmaan. But no community currently available to theatergoers is more distinctive than the inhabitants of Casa Valentina.

Casa Valentina is the nickname for a Catskills resort that, in 1962, caters to a clientele of male cross-dressers. (Such a place did exist, called Chevalier d'Eon, or, more casually, Casa Susanna.) As the guests are usually quick to assert, they are not gay, they are not drag queens, and they are most certainly not would-be Christine Jorgensens. Instead, they are husbands and fathers who simply crave the opportunity to get in touch with their inner female, usually with the aid of a wig and matching twinset. Their satisfaction is largely psychological and although they like to look nice, glamour is not the point. Most of them resemble the members of a suburban bridge club.

This is rich material for the playwright, Harvey Fierstein, who has made a career exploring sexuality and gender, and he lends his considerable skill to creating this community of men who just want to be women, as often as possible. The place is operated by George, aka Valentina and his highly supportive wife, Rita, a "GG," or genuine girl. As the play begins, they are hosting a weekend that consists almost entirely of their inner circle: the plump, outrageous Bessie; the tough, wisecracking Gloria; the elderly Terry; and Amy, who when in mufti is a respected local jurist. There are two newcomers: Jonathon, a first-timer (and newlywed) who is tentatively embracing his alter ago, named Miranda, and Charlotte, the head of the Sorority, the national organization for cross-dressers, and the publisher of a magazine for which Valentina writes a column dispensing beauty tips.

From the first moments of Joe Mantello's production, however, an elegiac note is struck, especially in Fitz Patton's melancholic incidental music; this particular weekend will be fateful for all involved. For one thing, the resort is financially imperiled, and Valentina desperately needs a loan from Charlotte. In addition, Charlotte has big news: She has registered the Sorority with the US government as a not-for-profit organization, the first step in what she sees as the eventual integration of transvestites into society. This plan is greeted with total resistance from the rest, all of whom fear exposure and the loss of their retreat from the world. Meanwhile, a scandal, involving gay pornography and the Post Office, looms in the background. The offending material was mailed to Valentina, though it was intended for one of his guests -- but whom?

The question goes right to the heart of Fierstein's play, which makes the caustic, but not-inaccurate point that imperiled minorities are no more tolerant of others than anyone else -- maybe less so, given their own uncertain status. Charlotte's vision of the Sorority is an association of heterosexual family men; gays need not apply. (She has been jailed for distributing her magazine and, more than the others, she craves respectability for herself and her kind.) Terry immediately balks, noting that gay men have been their only friends, hosting them at bars and dances without making unwanted advances. Gloria acidly notes that some of them may not be as straight as they believe. Bessie just wants things to stay as they are. ("What do I know about homos?" he wonders, fluffing up his party dress.) But the nice little white gloves come off as Charlotte, an iron butterfly if ever there was one, practices some genteel blackmail on one member of the group in order to bring them all around to her point of view. "It's almost impossible to imagine a queer at the center of this paradise," she says, a comment that triggers a public incident signaling that their paradise may soon be lost.

Fierstein, writing his first non-musical in decades, explores this subculture with his usual wit and panache, daring us to blink when a man dressed in matching Chanel suit and heels deplores the influence of "fags" among them. His knack for dialogue hasn't deserted him: "Bessie, you dear old thing, you are living proof that the good die young," says Valentina, by way of saying hello. And he is especially skillful at maneuvering the various plot elements into a pattern that climaxes in a moment of truth that none of the characters want.

Mantello has assembled a crack team of character men (plus a couple of women) to bring this fragile, threatened community to life. Patrick Page is firmly in charge as the dapper George, who, as Valentina, ignores all sorts of warning signs in his eagerness to slip into something less comfortable. (As we learn, dressing as a woman is tough on a guy; if the shoes don't kill you, the undergarments will.) Tom McGowan charms as the obstreperous, attention-seeking Bessie. ("I'm a decorated war hero wearing a housecoat and turban," he notes.) Besides having the most plausible drag, Nick Westrate handles each of Gloria's tart observations with aplomb. John Cullum is a genial presence as Terry, the only member of the group old enough to remember wearing petticoats. Larry Pine is carefully understated as the Judge, who among them has the most to lose. Gabriel Ebert is a standout as Jonathon, who is terrified of his own desires, and yet who takes to playing Miranda with an almost childlike glee. And Reed Birney, looking surprisingly like Bette Davis and waving a cigarette with alarming assurance, demonstrates the fine art of using pressure tactics without ever raising his voice.

On the distaff side, Mare Winningham delivers splendidly as Rita, who insists that she is married to George and that Valentina is "a kind of in-law," especially when, at long last, she wants to know where she stands in her own marriage. And the ever-reliable Lisa Emery, as the daughter of one of the guests, shows up just long enough to deliver a brief, devastating assessment of her father's friends and depart, leaving plenty of emotional wreckage in her wake.

The action unfolds on Scott Pask's cleverly laid-out set, a series of platforms that, with a slight adjustment, can take us from the first to the second floor of the house; there's also a charming outdoor stage where three of the guests lip-synch to the McGuire Sisters singing "Sugar in the Morning." Justin Townsend's lighting adds to the melancholic mood, especially in an opening sequence that quietly highlights each of the men at his vanity table. Rita Ryack's costumes are fine examples of the slightly dowdy, suburban housewife fashions the men prefer; Jason P. Hayes' wig and makeup designs are a perfect complement, especially when the gang teams up to give Jonathon/Miranda a makeover. In addition to his evocative music, Patton provides a number of effects, including music for the gang's dance party.

Fierstein drew a mixed press for Casa Valentina, but to my eyes, this is a remarkably assured return to plays after decades in the musical theatre. He draws his fond and foolish characters with remarkable empathy, even as he exposes the hypocrisy that will rip them apart. There's something almost Chekhovian about Charlotte's insistence that, in 50 years, gays will still be objects of revulsion while transvestites will be accepted members of society. Little does she know that, only a few years hence, a gay drag queen will strike a cop in Greenwich Village and an entirely different future will begin to unfold.--David Barbour