Stage Review - Love, Loss, and What I Wore (WWCA)
Stage Review - Love, Loss, and What I Wore
Presented By: Western Washington Center for the Arts (WWCA), Port Orchard, WA
Show Run: January 19 - February 4, 2024
Date Reviewed: Friday, January 19, 2024 (Opening Night)
Reviewed By: Greg Heilman
What is it like to be a woman in America? It’s a question that, unless you actually live through the experience, is hard to answer. It’s clear that men and women are held to different standards socially, with men usually given a lot more leash, especially when it comes to things like appearance. Women are asked to put a lot of thought, generally, into trends such as hairstyles, and even more so wardrobe, so as they go through and experience life, it’s not surprising to think that memory and clothing are inexorably tied together. Over the years, author Ilene Beckerman realized that there was something to this, that a community of women could find stories that illustrate this bond between memory and wardrobe compelling and relatable, and published it as a book that Nora Ephron and her sister Delia adapted into a stage play, a version of which is currently onstage at Western Washington Center for the Arts in Port Orchard.
Love, Loss, and What I Wore is the result of these compilations and is both written and structured for the stage as a series of monologues, where a cast of seven women alternate, and sometimes collaborate on the telling of these stories. It’s meant to have a sort of coffee clutch feel to it, where the actors are conversing among themselves, while also bringing the audience into the telling, inviting the theatre patrons into this community. The actors ruminate on topics such as shoes, purses, and boots, while also taking turns, presenting their characters’ backstories to the audience. Some of the best segments in the play, called “The Clothesline”, focus on one specific topic, including those from bras to dressing rooms, as well as the inability of women to figure out why there is never anything to wear in their closets. Most of the humor comes in these topical segments, and that humor comes from the sheer relatability of the stories. Most women know what it’s like to go to the store with their mother (or father) to purchase their first bra or how it feels to try on clothes in a dressing room surrounded by other women doing the same, so there’s a commonality between the experiences of the women on stage and a real relatability for those watching. And before you think that this is geared only toward women, I’ll just say that contrary to popular belief, men, too, struggle to find the right thing to wear in their closet. Maybe we’re just not as vehement or vocal about it, but it is real!! And the bottom line is that’s really what makes this work, there’s something here for everyone and I doubt that any one person can come away from Love, Loss, and What I Wore without feeling that there’s a least a little part of their life portrayed on stage.
The WWCA production, directed by Neicie Packer and assisted by Lena Sandell features seven local actors as the storytellers on stage. The cast consists of Bobbi Weatherholt, Ronni Wolfe, Diana George, Ashley Corbaley, Jody Wolfborn, Brenda Walls, and Jenni Moore. Each actor, with the exception of Bobbi, plays multiple roles, typically a primary character in addition to any number of others that support some of the collaborative storytelling. It is within these primary character depictions where the heavier moments in the show can be found, as the actors relate personal experiences, not all of them rosy, but of course that’s life, and it’s this humanity that provides the depth to Love, Loss, and What I Wore. Bobbi Weatherholt is the sole actor with only one role, that of Gingy. Bobbi does a nice job here, a steady performance as the thread that knits the play together. She may not have the strongest stage presence in the cast, that belongs to Diana George, but as the de facto lead here, it’s a very good performance. Diana’s performance (Nora, Geralyn, Mary, Amanda, and Holly ) is the most emotionally commanding of the group, and she brings a believability to the role that expertly draws the audience into her storytelling. Another strong performance is from Ronni Wolfe (Heather, Lynne, Alex’s Mother, and Eve’s Shrink). Ronni is strong in the development of various accents for her characters, but her high point is in the the telling of “Lynne’s Story” in Act 2. Extremely well done. Ashley Corbaley’s performance in the “Boots” segment is also a memorable one, so good that I was hoping she had more dialogue as the show progressed than she did. The entire cast is extremely capable here. Beyond those strong individual performances, there are a number of highlights from the collaborative scenes, including those with Jody Wolfborn, Jenni Moore, and Ashley Corbaley, or with Brenda Walls and Jenni Moore. These scenes require a quick interplay between the actors, and they all deliver. Rounding out the cast is Veronica Mihai and Haven Walls, who take turns modeling the clothes referred to by the actors in their monologues. Hats off to costume designers Neicie, Karla Crowell, and Kristi Ann Jacobson for designing a wardrobe to match the script, but even more so to Veronica and Haven for an excellent job with some pretty quick changes.
On the production side, the setup here is a bit curious. Each of the actors walks onto the stage individually, hangs up an article of clothing on the wall (purses, etc.) or in the wardrobe, then proceeds to sit behind a music stand on which rests the show’s script. It’s this that I find the most interesting, and also what I believe holds the show back from being as good as it could be. Don’t get me wrong, this cast of storytellers is excellent, to a person, but the strongest parts of the show are when the actors step out from behind their respective stands and engage with the audience. Alternately, when they’re seated, there’s a distance between the actors and the audience, which would be fine if perhaps they were organized in more of an arc and less of a straight line, to depict that coffee clutch feeling. Sitting down, especially when the actors are beholden to their script, and in some cases pause to find their place, it feels more like a staged reading than a fully fleshed out stage production. On this opening night performance, most actors seemed to use the script as a cue, while others appeared at times to use it as a crutch, which is always a risk in these situations. There seemed to be a little more interaction between the actors in Act 2, which could be a result of them becoming looser as the opening night show progressed, but more of that, interaction between the actors during the storytelling can only help elevate the production. The other callout I have is around music. Yes, I realize that this isn’t a musical, but there is a segment in which a particular song is referenced, and it would follow that the song mentioned would be the one played in the context of the show. I also understand licensing costs, and theaters on a shoestring budget, and while the song that is used is good, it just feels like it doesn’t fit. All of this said, it’s important to note that none of this is so detrimental to the overall enjoyment of the show, but rather I feel that it’s held back from what it could be.
Love, Loss, and What I Wore is classic Nora Ephron. The trials of life as a woman in America, and how wardrobe as a common thread through memory and experience, is told with humor, heart, and poignancy. Director Neicie Packer has assembled a wonderful group of storytellers who have come together to take the audience through the female experience, while making the story relatable to both women and men alike. Love, Loss, and What I Wore will make you laugh, cry, gasp, and sigh, but most importantly it will bring you into something more important than all of that, community.
Love, Loss, and What I Wore runs onstage at Western Washington Center for the Arts through February 4. For more information, including ticket availability and purchase, visit https://wwca.us. Note that this production contains adult language and situations and may not be suitable for younger viewers.
Photo credit: Four Foot Photography
