By Carol Davis
CARLSBAD, California — “If only I could change the past…?” How many times have we had this conversation with ourselves? “I would do this or that differently”. “I would say this or that to him or her”. “If I had it to do over again…”
In Jamie Pachino’s touching and lyrical new play Waving Goodbye, now making its San Diego Premiere at the New Village Arts Theatre in Carlsbad, hello’s and goodbye’s, regrets and fears and needs and wants are on the line for Lily Blue (Rachael Van Wormer), Jonathan Blue (Jeffrey Jones) and Amanda Blue (Kristianne Kurner).
Orbiting around these three are H. Bogsworth Barry or ‘Boggy’ (Kyle Lucy) whose famous artist father gave up his lucrative painting career, ‘the cost of professional success’ he laments. He and Lily are schoolmates.
Finally Perry Marshall (Amanda Morrow) owns an art gallery and is a best family friend and godmother to Lily, who knows all the news that’s fit to write about the Blues family. Her gallery hosted Amanda’s first works that catapulted her to fame.
Strong characters all; each and every one of the Blue family is committed to their own firmly held beliefs, their art and or lack thereof to get on with it, and their stubbornness to change.
Waving Goodbye is a story of love, abandonment, grief and change that are all living in the complicated minds, hearts and wills of these characters that want nothing but everything from each other. Lilly wants her Dad back, but he’s dead. Jonathan wants his wife to be happy with her life, but which part and how?
Amanda wants to find her ‘light’ so she can shine again as an artist/sculptor. Perry wants Amanda to come up with some new works for a new show. ‘Boggy’ wants Lily but Lily is too steeped in her own obstinacy to open herself to anyone or anything.
If it sounds too complex and contradictory, well that’s life. It’s also what happens when one leg of a three-legged stool goes missing. Try two legs. That’s the way Lily sees it.
Seventeen-year-old Lily has been in her father’s care since her mother left the family to pursue her sculpting career when Lily was just five. Jonathan is a mountain climber who takes groups or adventure seekers on climbing expeditions. He met her mother while she was ‘looking for her light’ atop Mt. Kathmandu.
He’s gone more often than not leaving Lily on her own. It was Lily who he called when he fell from Mt. Everest while with a group. He wanted to let her know he was trapped in a deep ravine with no way to be seen or rescued
(“Sometimes when my father dies, wrapped in icicles. Sometimes he lays in a bed of ice and snow, and when he wakes, and it begins to thaw…he melts into our house, breaks open the windows, runs down our walls and lands on our heads. Just to make sure we’re awake.”)
Now near homeless and lost, Amanda returns to the home after she learns of Jonathan’s death. Lily’s not interested in any kind of relationship with her mother and Amanda doesn’t know how to have a relationship with her daughter. “I don’t want to make friends with you,” Lily argues. “I don’t want to know you better. I don’t want to sit here while you pretend to be interested in me.”
The house is in shambles or near collapse. Lily, a budding photographer has pictures hanging on all the walls and frequent visits from Boggy (wonderfully played by Lucy) who seems to be the only person Lily can share her secrets with as well share a laugh. He’s the smile on the horizon Lily needs. His constant flow of rattling off riddles to her seems to be doing the trick.
On the other hand, she is annoyed with Amanda every time she enters her space, which seems to be the entire downstairs. “I don’t want you to feel bad, I just want you to go away.”
As the play goes back and fourth in time we get to see the before, during and after effects of the relationships along with the how’s and why’s of what happened to bring us to this point so that we are now able to follow the healing and grieving process that takes place with in the Blue family.
Director Dana Case has a sensitive eye and ear for Pachino’s words allowing the characters the urgency they need to express their feelings, to be heard and felt yet never hastening the process.
Her strong and confident cast makes the job easier. Rachael Van Wormer, just a tad old for a seventeen year old girl, reaches deep into her inner most parts and manages to show us the bumpy roller coaster she is going through grieving the loss of her father while rejecting the mother who left her. No easy task, that.
Artistic director, Kristianne Kurner’s Amanda, is equally powerful as the confused and lost wife, mother and sculptor. Kurner packs a compelling punch as she half-heartedly takes on the role of mother, a job she never really wanted, while rejecting any ovations by Perry intended to get her to work again. At the same time she struggles to convince herself that if she had it to do over again…you be the judge.
Morrow’s Perry is the balance between what was and what needs to be. She is right on target with a chipper, yet sympathetic ear. Jeffrey Jones is rock solid as the anchor in the family who shows up when needed, and young Barry is just what the doctor ordered showing how the aftermath of loss needn’t always be gloom.
Tim Wallace’s rather complicated two story set, with ladders to access the top level and a door or window that seems specifically for Boggy’s comings and goings, a top space for Jonathan to look down on the families travails and quick access for him to climb in and out of the picture, symbolic of his mountain treks, with a small space off to the right for Perry’s gallery is a maze but it works.
Christopher Loren’s lighting design, Wallace’s sound design and Kate Stallions’ costumes complete the picture for Pachino’s sensitive, thoughtful and challenging Waving Goodbye.
Absolutely worth a try.
See you at the theatre.
Dates: Through Feb. 6th
Organization: New Village Arts Theatre
Phone: 760-433-3245
Production Type: Drama
Where: 2787 State street, Carlsbad, CA 92008
Ticket Prices: $25.00-$30.00
Web: newvillagearts.org
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Davis is a San Diego-based theatre critic