Stage Capsule Reviews

Come Back to the 9 to 5, Dolly Parton, Dolly PartonWith one show left to go in a 10th-anniversary season that at times has seemed too celebratory, Late Night Theatre seems hungry again. Writer-director David Wayne Reed has marshaled everything that Late Night does well: the glorious get-ups, the bawdy puns, the dizzy set pieces that fizz as if he's crammed the entire history of pop culture into a Cuisinart with lemons and tequila. He also gives us a dick joke for the ages. Drag queen nonpareil DeDe Deville thrills. Gary Campbell's Dolly Parton looks like a dude, but when he rhapsodizes about life back in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, his face wells up, his accent deepens, and we feel the tingle of Dolly herself. Through Sept. 2 at Late Night Theatre, 1531 Grand, 816-235-6222. Reviewed in our Aug. 3 issue.

The Talley PlaysTalley's Folly, the moon-drunk romance set in late World War II is the first in Missouri playwright Lanford Wilson's trilogy concerning the Talley family of Lebanon, Missouri. It's named for a filigreed boathouse built years ago and now crumbling, a junk-shop marvel neglected by a family caught up in life and business. The Kansas City Actors Theatre is itself dedicated to the wonderfully impractical, producing all three Talley plays throughout the summer. Talley's Follycalls itself a waltz, and it starts breezily but builds to a swoon. Set 30 years later, Fifth of Julygives us the Talleys in the '70s, coping with adulthood, Vietnam and what has become of American life. Good as Follyis, Julyis even better. Its rich script glances against great themes without fuss. The acting is every bit as good as Wilson's words, and director Mark Robbins strips the show of all artifice. Talley & Son is somewhat cluttered in action and not always crisply acted. But it moves and thrills, particularly when it gives us the God's-eye view of history and how it shapes us. Through Sept. 3 at Union Station's City Stage, 18 W. Pershing Rd., 816-235-6222. Talley & Sonreviewed in our Aug. 17 issue.