There is no more beloved or popular comedy in American theater than “You Can’t Take It With You.”
Written in 1936, the middle of the Depression, when sticking together and trying to smile through tough times were survival tactics in American life, Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman’s play has maintained its vigor through more than 60 years, its sunny disposition never flagging, whether it be produced in a lowly church basement or in a grand repertory theater.
Times have changed in our country over the last seven decades, but our distrust of big government, our affection for lovable eccentrics and our desire for an ideal life free of money troubles and job pressures has stayed constant.
So when Grandpa Vanderhof, the wise old man of the comedy’s family, says he doesn’t pay income tax because he doesn’t believe in it, we still cheer him on (maybe even more so these days); and when he prays to the Man Upstairs to let everyone “just go along and be happy in our own sort of way,” we say “Amen” to that.
The play’s latest production, opening Raven Theatre’s 15th season, keeps up the comedy’s good will and free spirit.
Some bits of business, such as a lovely little dance for the two young lovers in the first act, have been cut, and a few characters have been eliminated. (The black maid and her happy-go-lucky, unemployed boyfriend have disappeared from the household.)
But the rest of the gang is right on cue: Penny, the mother who gave up painting and became a writer eight years ago when a typewriter was delivered to the house by mistake; Ed, the son-in-law who copies quotes from Trotsky on his printing machine and distributes them with his wife’s homemade candies; and Mr. DePinna, the former ice man, who now helps manufacture fireworks in the basement.
They truly are one big, happy family.
Director Michael Menendian, who also designed the comfortably cluttered setting of the Sycamore home, has encouraged his cast to breeze through the play as if they were having a marvelous time talking to and laughing with each other. It gives the play a nice, fresh feel, as if everything was happening for the first time, and though it loses some of the laugh lines on the way, things zip along so agreeably that it doesn’t matter.
JoAnn Montemurro is charming as the scatterbrained, warm-hearted Penny; Lisette Bross and Brian McCaskill are straight out of a ’30s true romance as the shop girl and the boss’ son who are madly in love with each other; and Jordan Teplitz, as Grandpa, toddles about jovially, leaving a trail of pixie dust.
To be in their presence and enjoy their good nature once again is a pleasure.
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“You Can’t Take It With You”
When: Through Dec. 7
Where: Raven Theatre, 6931 N. Clark St.
Phone: 773-338-2177
