Cat Rutledge plays Marjorie Taub and Phil Robertson is Dr. V. Ira Taub in “The Allergist’s Wife.”

By CONNIE FISHER

 Drama at The Warehouse Performing Arts Center is always a treat, and invariably thought provoking. Opening the 2013-14 season, “The Tale of The Allergist’s Wife” upholds The Warehouse’s reputation. It takes a talented brand of actor to deliver a timely barrage of enticing, at times even wicked lines of entertaining of adult comedy. Director Jim Esposito obviously knew what he was doing when he selected his cast and venue so well. 

Staging a production at The Warehouse is a work of art in itself. The audience might witness anything from simple wilderness from afar to a safari entwined among the audience to a lavishly appointed suburban kitchen complete with a working refrigerator and electric knife sharpener. In this case, Esposito decided to produce “The Allergist’s Wife” in the natural style of The Warehouse’s habitat, Black Box Theater.

As such, “the focus is all on the faces and talents of the cast,” Esposito explains. So it is up to the audience to imagine the contours of a well-appointed Upper West Side Manhattan apartment where a Jewish couple resides, allergist Ira Taub, portrayed by Philip Robertson, and his wife Marjorie, played by Cat Rutledge.

Rutledge is amazing. On stage, either in dialogue or monologue during practically every moment of the comedy’s two acts, Rutledge treats the audience to a wide range of emotions. When the show opens, Marjorie, a pseudo-intellectual who spends her days frequenting Manhattan’s cultural establishments, is in a Medea-like depression over the death of her favorite psychotherapist. Then, the unexpected arrival of her childhood friend Lee, whom she hasn’t seen for years, reverts Marjorie into to an adventurous, vivacious nymph. And the fun begins. Lee is played by Marla Brown, who runs the Warehouse.

When Brown steps on stage it is obvious that’s where she belongs. No matter the role—whether an innocent youth learning how to drive, a raging wife, or more recently, a bald patient dying of cancer on the Davidson stage, Marla Brown is a polished performer. It takes her kind of expertise to effectively create satirical havoc, with phrases and double takes that rattle the overly self-confident allergist and his emotionally fragile wife out of their mediocre doldrums.

In the style of “The Man Who Came to Dinner,” Lee entrenches herself into the Taub’s domain by enchanting her hosts with tales of escapades with just about everyone who is anyone somewhere in the world—Henry Kissinger, Princess Diana, even Ernest Hemingway. Until she begins to unravel some of her hidden “charms.” The kindly doctor becomes unhinged. It’s fun to watch Robertson deal with Taub’s ensuing conundrum between libido and morality.

Marjorie’s mother, Frieda, performed by Becky Porter, continually bops in and out of the apartment with whinny complains, mostly focused on her affectation to wrapped suppositories. Although Frieda’s lines are poignant, their brilliance is diminished by Porter’s lack of the intended accent of a stereotypical New York Jewish mother.

Gyanesh Pandey, who plays the doorman Mohammed, rounds out the cast. He’s a welcome dashing new figure to The Warehouse boards and in “Allergist” oozes the part.

The Warehouse’s season opener is fun. Taking a line from the comedy’s playwright Charles Busch, “The Allergist’s Wife” could be considered  “a cage in search of a bird.”

WANT TO GO? 

Performances of “The Tale of The Allergist’s Wife” conclude this weekend, with shows Thursday, Friday and Saturday, Sept. 6-8, at 8pm, and Sunday matinees at 2pm. Tickets may be reserved online at www.warehousepac.com or by calling the box office at 704-619-0429. The Warehouse Performing Arts Center is at 2916-A Westmorland Road in Cornelius.