The big news locally is that Tony and Obie Award winner Judith Ivey has directed a play at North Coast Repertory Theatre (987-D Lomas Santa Fe Drive) in Solana Beach. Written by Christian O’Reilly and titled “Chapatti” (continuing through Nov. 15), it’s another of those audience-pleasing works we’ve become accustomed to seeing at this venue. However, there’s a difference. Many serious issues lurk just below the surface of the love story that concerns two older people who meet in a veterinarian’s office and then become involved in a plot that swirls around a dead cat. It’s one of those dark comedies in which one frequently finds oneself among the few laughers. The script is that dark and clever and intellectually acute; never mind the “aww” factor. Dan (Mark Bramhall) and Betty (Annabella Price) are alone, living in a small Irish village, each having endured a variety of losses, some quite recent. He is a widower with only a mutt named Chapatti for company. He visits his beloved’s grave every day and in fact is so unhappy and reclusive that he plans to leave this mortal coil just as soon as he can find a good home for Chapatti and learn how to make a noose of the clothesline. The former activity leads to Betty, owner of 19 cats and kittens and a grass widow of some duration. She declares herself “the most hopeless nurse ever” until she married a man who turned out to be cold and uncaring and who kicked her out because she dared ask for more. Neither Dan nor Betty has children. Dan, who meets the outspoken Betty over a box of kittens (one of the play’s most amusing speeches is Betty telling why she prefers cats to dogs), assumes the task of finding the owner of a cat flattened by an automobile. The owner turns out to be a despondent friend of Betty’s, and so Dan and Betty plot to substitute an identical cat, hoping to prevent the friend’s meltdown. All the while, the attraction grows, with Dan fighting it every step of the way. There is much more to his story than he lets on. Bramhall is appealing, and Price is a force of nature as the determined Betty. When one considers the issues, it is a well-handled, substantive play. Price and Bramhall are highly successful West Coast actors whose excellent work is worth seeing. Two Asides Price was seen in 1984 at the Old Globe as another woman determined to save a man in spite of himself – the sister in Stephen Metcalfe’s “Strange Snow.” Screenwriter/playwright Metcalfe, by the way, is now a first-time novelist. His book, “The Tragic Life” (St. Martin’s), is available in bookstores. Read his blog at stephenmetcalfe.net. News from the Land of the Stage The New York Times reported last week that A.R. “Pete” Gurney’s “Sylvia” anticipates a Broadway opening at last. The show debuted off-Broadway in 1995 and played at the Old Globe, along with a plethora of other Gurney works, soon after. Readers may recall it’s a comedy about a man, a midlife crisis, a stray dog, and a wife who feels left out. “Sylvia” recently played at New Village Arts with San Diego actor Samantha Ginn in the title role. The Carlsbad theatre plans a revival June 6 to 28, again with Ginn. “Bright Star,” the bluegrass musical by Steve Martin and Edie Brickell that premiered at the Old Globe in last year, has announced a Broadway preview date of March 7, 2016, with an official opening March 31. The Broadway run follows its previously announced December-January engagement at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. The impressive singer/actor Carmen Cusack repeats the role she created, that of the magazine editor. Walter Bobbie directs. On the Big Screen Live,
and on the Little Screen Those who drooled of late in cinemas over Benedict Cumberbatch’s “Hamlet,” from National Theatre Live, will be happy to know that a 90-minute special titled “Sherlock: The Abominable Bride” will air on PBS’s “Masterpiece Mystery” on New Year’s Day.