ke it known to his family that he loved them while he was alive. Only Carl (Michael Castile), the family’s younger son, and the audience can see Dad or his ghost or whatever it is, so Carl must channel his father’s messages to the family.
FAMILY ACTS
Mom (Kris Schinske) acts as if she’s in the early stages of Alzheimer’s, and she may be the target of a con man (Shawn Hicks). Rounding out this annoyingly crazy family are older son Michael (Jerrad Allbritton) and his wife, Jill (Sarah Hull), who are hysterically trying to get pregnant, and daughter Stacy (Margaret Shippey), whom the family cruelly ignores. Jill collapses into a weeping fit at every mention of children. At Thanksgiving dinner, for which Mom makes corn dogs “? seemingly a sign of dementia “? Stacy is made to sit apart from the family at a solitary children’s table. She is not a child; she’s in her 20s. Olson never explains why the family acts as if Stacy is not there. Maybe this is something from the playwright’s own experience.
Carl is the only member of this family who is not a little nutty. In other words, Carl represents us, the audience, you and me. We are the sanest members of our families, aren’t we? We are supposed to identify with and root for this character in the play.
You can’t blame the cast for the deficiencies in “A Nice Family Gathering.” They don’t have much to work with in this inferior script. Castile, who is new to me, does a nice job. Allbritton plays Michael, who is a physician, but you wouldn’t want to see him standing over you at the operating table. Schinske looks far too young to play Mom.
“A Nice Family Gathering” does resemble Thanksgiving in one way: It’s a turkey.
“?Larry Laneer
This article appears in Dec 3-9, 2008.