Actress Ruth Schudson has had 65 opening nights with the Milwaukee Chamber Theatre, the company she co-founded with Montgomery Davis in 1975. Along the way she became Milwaukee's Judi Dench.
Her calm presence has grounded countless productions. Her stage skills have brought clarity, precision and accessibility to the shows in which she was cast. Schudson has bathed many an audience in her warmth, but she also summoned the wrath of God when the script called for it.
No other Milwaukee actor has had a career as long and a body of work as distinguished as Ruth Schudson. That makes it very special to say that the production of "Driving Miss Daisy" the Chamber Theatre opened last weekend is showcasing Schudson at her best.
She is in regal command of the Cabot Theatre stage, and not only is her performance spectacularly on target. The unassuming daughter of Ukrainian immigrants elicits great work from everyone around her.
Schudson's timing is needle sharp, and her perfectly calibrated tone is appropriately tart. The actress is making C. Michael Wright, the Chamber's producing artistic director, look mighty smart for reviving Alfred Uhry's 1988 Pulitzer Prize-winning comic drama.
Most of us have seen the original stage version of "Driving Miss Daisy" or the subsequent film, and we probably have a warm but not compelling memory of it. For many, "Daisy" resides in the been-there, done-that theatrical file.
The Chamber production, which Wright directed, makes a convincing argument that the single-act play deserves another look. While "Daisy" is a bit patronizing and follows a predictable sentimental path, it is written with such grace and deftness, the piece is ultimately satisfying.
Schudson portrays the title character, an aging and cantankerous Jewish widow of means living in Atlanta in the middle of the 20th century. When she loses control of her car in a sensational crash, Daisy Werthan's son hires a slightly younger African-American man to be her chauffeur.
The stubbornly independent Daisy vows to take the bus rather than ride in the back seat of her vehicle, but she relents, and we watch a friendship evolve between the white woman and the black man over 25 years. The story gently reflects both the economic gulf that has existed between blacks and Jews, and the common bond of second class citizenship they shared for much of the century.
Michael A. Torrey's portrait of Hoke, Daisy's driver, is as real and genuine as Schudson's work in the production. Torrey possesses a physicality that suggests the dignity and deference an aging black man needed to survive in Georgia in the 1940s. We can feel a collected life wisdom and a sweet soul.
Daisy's son is a one dimensional character who exists to set up the story and occasionally move it along. Jonathan West makes him interesting.
The Chamber Theatre is hosting a tribute to Schudson at 7:30 p.m. Monday in the Broadway Theatre Center's Cabot Theatre. More than 20 past and present Milwaukee actors will participate in a special performance honoring Schudson. The group includes Carrie Hitchcock, Norman Moses, Dan Mooney, Flora Coker, Laura Gordon, Molly Rhode, Mary MacDonald Kerr and Susan Sweeney.
A champagne reception will follow. Tickets are $250, and the proceeds will finance the establishment of the new Ruth Schudson Leading Lady Fund, which will support the work of a Chamber Theatre actress each season.
Written by prolific dramatist Don Nigro, "Gorgons" is a thinly-veiled fictional account of Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, who hated each other, making the 1962 movie "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?" The two-character, one-act play is crammed full of snappy one-liners.
Fangs are out, venom flows and the action becomes so physically contentious, the production has a fight coordinator. That is most likely a first for a theater piece consisting of two female characters.
I wanted to find the erupting egos, high class vulgarity and general trampiness funny. Jennifer Rupp offers a delicious portrait of Joan Crawford, and Marcella Kearns' Bette Davis displays flashes of frightening intensity. These are the two hardest working actresses in show business at the moment.
But "Gorgons" fails to fully launch, and I think it is because the play has one foot in reality and the other in outrageousness.
Skylight Postpones Show
The Skylight Opera Theatre is postponing its Cabot Theatre production of "Edith Piaf Onstage" to next season because of the illness of veteran company performer Leslie Fitzwater, who is featured in the revue. Fitzwater is being treated with chemotherapy.
"Gershwin & Friends," a revue that sold out its run in the Broadway Theatre Center Studio Theatre last season, is being revived to replace the Piaf show. Cynthia Cobb, Parrish Collier and Paul Helm will return to perform Jan. 27 to Feb. 12.
Damien has been around so long, he was at Summerfest the night George Carlin was arrested for speaking the seven dirty words you can't say on TV. He was also at the Uptown Theatre the night Bruce Springsteen's first Milwaukee concert was interrupted for three hours by a bomb scare. Damien was reviewing the concert for the Milwaukee Journal. He wrote for the Journal and Journal Sentinel for 37 years, the last 29 as theater critic.
During those years, Damien served two terms on the board of the American Theatre Critics Association, a term on the board of the association's foundation, and he studied the Latinization of American culture in a University of Southern California fellowship program. Damien also hosted his own arts radio program, "Milwaukee Presents with Damien Jaques," on WHAD for eight years.
Travel, books and, not surprisingly, theater top the list of Damien's interests. A news junkie, he is particularly plugged into politics and international affairs, but he also closely follows the Brewers, Packers and Marquette baskeball. Damien lives downtown, within easy walking distance of most of the theaters he attends.
