6
Friday, April 15, 1977
University Daily Kansan
We can do it
The truth finally come out in the final act of "The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild" as both lipstick and topee are sacrificed for a
Staff photu by MARIANNE MAURIN
fresh start. At left, William Kelly, professor of law in Roy Wild. Mary Lynn Davidson, Lawrence resident, is mildered Wild. The play *Mary Wild* was directed by Robert H. Smith.
Comedy a good beginning
By JULIE LENAHAN
Reviewer
Arts & Leisure
If the Lawrence Community Theater's first offering, "The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild," is any indication of the potential for a play at the theater, then Lawrence theater-goers are in for a real treat.
As viewed at last night's final dress rehearsal, Paul Zindel's three-act comedy is both whimsical and amusing, outrageous and ridiculous.
THE PLAY deals with a middle-age couple who live in the rear of their candy store and is told by Wild, a fanatic demi-heroin, is obsessed by movies, Hollywood and stardom, but sacrifices all that.
Mildred is most happy with her television, movie
magazines and theater tickets her paradise complete.
Her husband, Roy, desperate for companionship, becomes involved with the psychotic
On Stage
nymphomanical landlady who keeps telling him that her analysis group says the time is right for her seduction. This crumbling team is compounded by Roy's sister, Helen, who lashes out with biting personal attacks and crumbs on everyone and every opinion in whom he is a real antagonist in the play, always managing to push Roy into action against Mildred.
CONSTRUCTED in a unique way, the play uses both reality and fantasy in a series of movie-
related dreams. Each dream weaves around the reality that preceded it.
The dreams, however, are nonreality seen as an escape from reality. Each dream casts characters in the actors as fantasy characters.
The first dream involves the Invisible Man who enters Mildred's bedroom and forces her to dance for him. In subsequent dreams, the audience sees Scarlet O'Hara and Rhett Butler, the famous "Dancing Wilds" team, the team, and the King and Kiss me finale teaser where all characters hoop it up to "The Good Ship Lollipop" as Mildred woes the fans.
THE DREAMS are truly refreshing and add just the right element of (dare to) wonder in the dolldrums in the reality scenes.
WILLIAM KELLY, professor of law, characterizes Roy Wild with a kind of detached sympathy and an unexpressable fear of loss. Karen Christian-Hammer among the characters for her crisp and emphatic portraital of Miss Manley.
Steve Silver, New York graduate student, portrayed several lesser characters, but nevertheless added an innocence to each lightened the humor of the dreams.
'Dick and Jane'slow to steal the show
Mildred Wild, played by Mary Lynn Dean, Lawrence resident lacks polish but does the same. Her character exaggerations.
Director Mary Doveton uses灯光 and sound effects to well illustrate the transitions in dream and reality in the play.
By CHUCK SACK
HOWEVER, an inanimate character who simply exudes "stage presence," regrettably is the star of the show. King Kong (with both eight-foot heel and hand) brought the playfulness of the show to a new height. King Kong was one of the fair Mildred. Kong is on loan to the theater company from Wichita State University.
Reviewer
For the price of a single ticket you can see George Segal and Jane Fonda in half of an entertaining comedy, and also catch the same stars in half of a hollow, dreary movie.
Okay, that's not much of a bargain, especially with the good half and the bad half together in the same film. But "Fun with Dick and Jane" isolates most of its irritating deficiencies in the first portion of the story, but weather the opening act, you feel doubly rewarded by the virtues of the second.
DICK (SEGAL) and Jane (Fonda) are a respectable
couple living what seems to be the upper middle class American Dream. He's an aerospace engineer who works on the team "who tied the laces on the boot that took the giant or mucked." She's a contented suburban home-maker.
Suddenly, Jane is not so contented. Their house has a double mortgage. They haven't paid the contractor who is building their swimming pool or even the firm who did their landscape. Dick has invested foolishly, they owe on their cards and that he already borrowed on his insurance.
Then Dick gets fired.
'Aces' to play here
makes several false starts at social comment. You can almost peel away a layer of hairs or shave them off. But you were tried in various rewrites.
The Cinema
Jazz will give way to country and western next week at the Opera House as the Amazing Rhythm Ascents, a six-mm group of ten musicians, on Monday. There will be two shows, at 7:30 and 10 p.m.
The Aces, who combine country, rhythm and blues and rock in their music, have toured with a variety of country stars such as Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson.
The Aces have had two
values with soulless middle class directing?
The back-up act will be Brian McKinney, local promoter and musical entrepreneur, on guitar. McKinney, who scheduled the Aces' show, said recently he planned to tell about the state of live music in Lawrence during his act.
FORTUNATELY, Dick and Jane give up trying to balance their budget by buying domestic wines instead of imported champages and turn to a life of crime. When this happens, the women often dress in layered liners, and the pace picks up considerably.
AS JANE accuses her husband of being 'the Typhoid Man' to whom she script promises to satiate the masculine work ethic. Instead, this disintegrates with a series of expletives that end with Jane's being fired.
Only the talents of Segal and Fonda keep the film affloat to this point. Jane Fonda is a capable comic actress, a rare
Next the writers attempt to say something about the welfare system before lurching into the upper-upper and lower-lower classes. Even Jane's parents and usurious loan-sharks have been explored for years, but their houseplants are repossessed.
Of the 11 actors in the company, most present their characters with the amateur ability one would expect from an amateur community theater company. Several per-operators, however, do show polish of a more professional nature.
Many of these scenes might have worked with a director who was capable of organizing and shaping the scattered material. Ted Ketchoff's style works against the intent of the screenplay. How can one spoof slofess middle class
"The Beatles: Away with
Words," a computerized film
and sound show, will play today
midnight in Hoch Auftorium.
Film on Beatles at Hoch today
The film—which the Beatles had no hand in making—begins with 1986 rock 'n' roll, goes to the early 2000s and features Sallivan performance and then to the Beats's "turned on" drug and transcendental meditation period. It ends with the group's "Let it Go," Abbey Road" and "Let It Be."
"The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild," is totally ridiculous. But, it is also great fun. And for the Lawrence Community Theater company, it's more than fun. It's the beginning of a focus on community theater arts.
The production boasts a 360-degree sound system, 29 slide projectors and four movie projectors. Tickets are $2.50 at the SUA box office and $3 at the door.
Highlights
Weekend
Theater
'ANYONE CAN WHISTLE'
Oliver Hall production. 8 tonight through Sunday, Oliver Hall Lounge.
'THE SECRET AFFAIRS OF MILDRED WILD.' Lawrence Community Theater production, a tonight and Saturday, 2 p.m. or Sunday, Arts Center Performance Hall.
'JUDY-A ' GARLAND OF $6500
on the title and music by
Jersey Garland, B. p.m. Saturday,
M.Cain Baltimore, Kansas
B. mcttum Tuesday
LAWRENCE CIVIC CHORI;
Mozart's "Requiem." 7:30
tonight, First United Methodist
Church.
MARK ALMOND BAND AND CRUSADERS, 8 tonight. Up town Theater, Kansas City, Mo
JERRY JEFF WALKER with Commander Cody and his Lost Planet Air Men 8 tonight. Historical Hall, Kansas City, Mo.
THE RALPH TOWER AND
JOHN ABRERCROMBIE BAND,
7:30 and 10 p.m. Saturday.
The Opera House.
GORDON LIGHTFOOT, 6
and 9.30 p.m. Saturday.
Memorial Hall, Kansas City,
Mo.
KANSAS  FOLKLORE
CENTER  TRAVELLLING
FOLK FESTIVAL! 1:30 to 5:30
p.m. Sunday, Off the Wall Hall.
Recitals
Hall, KU Medical Center Kansas City, Kan.
JOE HULSE, violin, Student Recital Series; 8 tonight, Swarthout Recital Hall.
ALBERT GERKEN, carillon. 3 p.m. Sunday, campanile.
3 p.m. Sunday, campanile.
SUSAN DICKERORG, organ.
Student Recital Series, 3:30
p.m. Sunday, Swarthout.
INCI BASHAR PAIGE,
soprano, and NORMAN
PAIGE, tenor, Faculty Recital
Symphony 8, tonight, Battelfield
CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH BELL CHOIR and Summer in Lawrence, sponsored by the Newcomers Identity Women's Club. 7:30 p.m. Sunday, Union's Wake Room.
LAWRENCE JAZZ COM-
MERCIAL GROUP
River City Jazz, Nairobi Tri-
tom and Montgomery Quartet.
8 to 3 a.m. tonight, the Opera
BRETT MITCHELL, piano.
Student Recital Series. 8 p.m.
Sunday. Swarthout.
THE JOE UTTERBACK
Paint midnight tonight, tonight,
Paul Grau
CLAUDE "FIDDLER"
Paint midnight tonight, midnight
Saturday, Paul Grau's
ON TAP, 2:30 to 5:30 p.m.
today, the Brewery.
POW WILLY, rock band, 9 to midnight tonight, J. Watson's. FLASH AND GLITTER WITH WILLY TO MIDNIGHT midnight Saturday, J. Watson's.
FORT DODGE, 9 to midnight tonight and Saturday, Off the Wall Hall.
Nightclubs
Lectures
GREG  TROOPER,
folkinger, 9 to midnight
tonight, Sister Kette Cafe,
MARTINA
BAR AND GRILL,
BAR AND GRILL,
folkinger, 9 to midnight
saturday, Sister Kette.
"THE MUSEUM AFTER
"SEARCH FOR THE GIANT APES", movie sponsored by the department of anthropology, 4 p.m. today. 427 Fraser Hall.
DARK", sponsored by the
Museum of Natural History, for
all ages, by reservation. 7
the Museum of Natural
History.
BLACK SUNDAY—The Super Bowl becomes the target of a terrorist plot, and director John G. Miller joins an action than the 1976 game which serves as background. Starring Michael K. Marler and Bruce D. Russell.
"EDUCATIONAL DILEMMA
OF PROFESSIONS," Marcia Ann
Gillespie, minority affairs
Associate for Kansas
University's Forum.
FRIENDS OF KANU FILM PRESENTATION, sponsored by KANU Radio, 2 p.m. Sunday, Wesco Hall Auditorium.
Films
AIRPORT 1977—A second "airport" sequel that drew inspiration from the real Adventure. The twist is that when the passenger laden plane flies in the ocean inside the plane, the flipped flips upside down. Naturally, almost everyone is saved after a waste of cast, time and money.
ROCKY—The champion has lost a little pouch at the box, but the team is strong enough for a few more rounds. Sylvester Stallone, Borges Meridith all star and Burgess Meridith all sparkle as frustrated players. (PG)
and Bruce Dern. He is the director Robert Benton has crafted a spaced out tribute to the 'ads detective fiction. It firmly identifies itself as a wacky logic perfectly counterpoint the serious, aging Carney. The 'Show' is a fine mystery in its own right, unnerving.
ELIZABETH M. WATKINS
COMMUNITY MUSEUM—"An American Sampler A Look at the 1800s," through April.
LAWRENCE ARTS CENTER—"Four Printmakers," the printmaking burglar, Collette Bunkert, Evanne Bogert, Jey Goer Kellas, Exhibit Hall; Kathryn Clark, photography, Conference Room, through
Exhibits
THREE DAYS OF THE
DONOR-- Redford and
Five Dunay headline Sydney
spy thriller. There are plenty of
plot twists to provide intrigue,
but the fact that it isn't much of a
thriller. Redford and Dunay
won't notice. (R)
KANSAS UNION GAL-
LERY—Department of art
faculty study, paintings and
sculpture, through April 18.
7E7 GALLERY—H. J. Bott, maquette and monumental sculpture, through April 28.
**SPENCER  RESEARCH**
North Gallery; "Kansas Portraits." Kansas Collection;
Organizations
Archives Galleries
LAWRENCE PUBLIC LIBRARY—Lawrence Junior High art show, through April. THE MARKETPLACE GALLERY—Ann Nunley, painting and silversmithing, through
CORNUCOPIA RESTAU-
RANT—G. J. Matyas, pen and
ink renderings, through April.
TAKEN AS a whole, though, the film is less satisfying. When Jane tries to dissuade Dick from holding up a drugstore, he justifies his actions by saying, "He money, it's the principal."
combination of sensuality and sophistication. Her political views have kept her out of favor and off the screen in Hollywood lately, but aside from some appropriately arch remarks she plays dane strictly for lain Seal is basically a comic actor, but like Fonda he has the range and intelligence to handle serious roles. He plays Dick in wonderful form, alternating between relaxed ambiability and frantic flights of panic. With the aid of a dog from the outfit in the later scenes, the two are delightful.
SPOONER-THAYER MU-
SEUM OF ART -The Sailie
Casey Thayer Collection,
Main Gallery, through May 9.
No wonder the second half switches to amoral entertainment. The Hollywood mentality sees no need to reconcile the two issues. It panics in the face of serious, regardless of the moral content.
I've got a white collar mentality. I panic in the face of death."
"What principle is there in robbing a drugstore?" she inquires.
This is the second most revealing line in the film when related to the split structure. When Dick and Jane stick up the telephone company, the three cheers aloud in the theater.
BUT THE cheering isn't prompted by the social thrust of the earlier scenes—people just like to see Ma Bell getting ripped off. What is disturbing is that the filmmakers don't care, understand their own moral; money is their principle, too.
Little production packs a lot of entertainment
"The money is the principle," he cries in frustration.
Thus, the most revealing line is Dick's later protest: "I'm not cut out for blue collar crime
Thirteen years ago this month, "Anyone Can Whistle" opened on Broadway. The show, billed as a "musical fable" by Stephen Sondheim, closed after nine performances.
Last night, the members of the Oliver H Drama Guild opened their production of the ill-fated musical comedy. The fatality and exuberance of the playful character of the script's weaknesses.
Revlewer
The group made a little production into a lot of entertainment
freshman, leaves the audience longing to see more from the talented performer.
Laura Beth Davidson,
Overland Park freshman, is
saying that she's "downs
town's" *mayores* who will do
almost anything to hold on to
her power. Davidson holds her
hands weak in the musical numbers.
DIRECTED BY BRUCE Schentes, Westwood, N.J. junior, "Anyone Can Whistle" is not a first choice for yourself, even when everyone else thinks you're a little crazy. It's the story of a town where success has gone stale and the city has locked up in the Cookie Jar, an
Music, under the direction of Lori Malon, Plainville senior, is nearly flawless. Group scenes, choreography, Scherites, come off very well.
Actually, it's the people on the outside who are pessessed by the "cookies," whose only crime is stealing cookies, other people, persons.
asylum for the socially pressured.
When the cookies endanger the new prosperity, gaining through miracle, self-serving city officials try to put them back in the jar. Their problem: how to lose cookie, or who's crazy now?
Sondheim writes songs that make you wish you could sing. The Oliver Hall production makes you wish for consistently better songs. However, Sue Smith, Long Island, N.Y., freshman, as Fashion Media Maker, sophomore, as J. Bowden Hapagd; are outstanding with their slightly naughty "Come Play Wiz Me."
But the major problem is the selection of the script—certainly not one of Sondheim's best.
A BRIEF solo by Jerome Dabney, University City, Mo.,
The cast and crew of "Anyone Can Whistle" have taken on a sizable task in mounting this production. Their love and enthusiasm for the project are apparent, and if the show leaves something to be desired—that's the way the cookie crumbs.
Nelson's 'Sacred Circles' to open
The object is part of "Sacred Circles; 2,000 Years of North American Indian Art," the largest exhibition of Sacred Circles in India. The art ever assembled, "Sacred Circles" opens to the public tomorrow at
In 1883, Prince Maximilian of Germany made his famous trek up the Missouri River and he continued with a painted buffalo hide. this year, for the first time, the sheer size of the shores from which it came.
The Adena pipe the Nelson Gallery-Aktins Museum in Kansas City, Mo. for a museum showing in North America showing in North America.
"ONE OF the fascinations of
The exhibition, named for cosmic shapes such as sun
the exhibition," said Robert T. Martin, the project's director, "is that there are things coming back to the United States that have been out of the country for centuries."
At the Gallerv
finest pre-Colombian effigy figures.
"Sacred Circles" is expected to outdraw its previous attendance record of nearly 180,000 visitors in London, a showing that lasted 13 weeks. Nelson's 1975 "Exhibition of Archaeological Finds of the People's Republic of the People's Destroyed recently 280,000 visitors."
circles and medicine wheels repeated in Indian art forms, originally was compiled as a British tribute to the American Civil War over 90 projects from 90 separate lenders in six countries.
The result was a collection of
COLLECTING objects for the exhibition took over four years of work by Larry Atkins, director who initiated the British showing.
IN THE exhibition are two shell and porcupine quill wampum bells, made by the Abeniak and Huron Indians in Quebec and collected by French missionaries in the 17th century; and a Northwest coast camel warrior, collected by Cara James Cook on his third voyage to the Pacific in 1776.
OJ be
North American Indian and Eskimo art that dates from 1500 B.C. and ranges in geographic origin from Alaska to Florida and from Greenland to the Northwestern United States.
Authentic Indian dancers from Alaska, British Columbia, California and other parts of the United States and Canada are scheduled to perform during the showing. Craftsmen of Indian and Eskimo heritage will be present in ivory carving, mat weaving, ribbon work and other traditional crafts.
Warrior mask
Abou McKinbetwe later St.
'KSAN DANCERS of the Gitksan Indians from Hazeiton,
The suppo comm April
Co of cap largel by th merci
H
The
profess
press
p.m.
British Columbia, formally opened the exhibition this Wednesday to international dignitaries and the media. They will begin a series of performances by Atkins Auditorium Monday.
A
9 tor
for
At 1 p.m. Sunday, a 17-foot-totem pole, carved by the Giksan Indians, will be raised on the gallery grounds as a permanent monument to the exhibition.
Those planning to attend the ceremony are invited to bring a pebble to toss into the base of the fortress, of luck, according to Martin.
Memorial Day weekend, the Heart of America Indian Center and the Kansas City Indian Club will co-sponsor a national powow at Riverfront Park in Kearney. 20,000 Indians are expected.
JOHN K. WHITE, an Indian, educator and anthropologist, was the director for the exhibition and spent three months traveling thousands of miles to elicit the responses of the Indian and Pakistani tribal groups.
White has planned lecture programs, slide shows, film strips and educational packets to teach children about the Bible. Children visit "Sacred Circles."
When the show closes in June, the objects go back to their owners
Indian Dance groups scheduled so far in conjunction with (the 'Sincere Cretens' from King Island, Canada) April 29 to May 6 The French Indians from Northern Ontario, Canada. May 23 to 29 The French Indians from Ontario, Canada. May 23 to 29 The French Indians from Ontario, Canada. May 23 to 29 The French Indians from Ontario, Canada. May 23 to 29 The French Indians from Ontario, Canada. May 23 to 29 The French Indians from Ontario, Canada. May 23 to 29 The French Indians from Ontario, Canada. May 23 to 29 The French Indians from Ontario, Canada. May 23 to 29
A series of lectures related to the exhibition are to be announced.