Backstage.com Review of For the Love of Tiffany
September 05, 2003
For the Love of Tiffany
Reviewed By Esther Tolkoff
"For the Love of Tiffany"
Theater: Wings Theatre
Location: 154 Christopher St., NYC
Starts: August 13, 2003
Ends: August 22, 2003
Presented by: Matthew Brookshire, Amanda Green, Thomas Mizer, Curtis Moore and the Present Company as part of the seventh annual New York International Fringe Festival
For the Love of Tiffany is hilarious in its tongue-in-cheek send-up of soapy made-for-TV movies (such as those seen on networks like Lifetime Television), worshipful fans, and divadom, as embodied in Tiffany (Nancy Opel), the star of all the movies. It's great fun, and director Matthew Brookshire (who co-wrote the book with Thomas Mizer) keeps everything moving smoothly.
Stephanie (Marnie Nicolella) rushes home from her job with a real estate firm to adoringly watch Tiffany's films, then dashes to her computer and logs on to a chat room where other fans cyber-sigh over Tiffany's plights and outfits.
An elaborate and cleverly silly plot evolves that brings Stephanie and her co-worker "Stezen with a Z" (Jonathan Dokuchitz) -- who has amnesia and thinks he's gay because his doctor told him so -- to cross paths with Tiffany as they must convince her to sell her home for reasons too (deliberately) convoluted to detail here. It's all very funny.
While Tiffany is outwardly a commanding diva -- bossing around her Guatemalan housekeeper (Rebecca Jones) and her wheelchair-bound Germanic cleaner (Amanda Green) -- Tiffany's life is actually a mess. She drinks. Her husband Trevor (Dokuchitz) and her past amours are all soap archetypes and are all disasters.
The plot has endless twists. The references to Tiffany's past television films -- all a chance to futher parody the plots and titles -- are dead on. Actors Jeremy Peter Johnson, Dokuchitz, Green, Jones, and Michael Lluberes play multiple roles deftly. The songs (lyrics by Green, who is the daughter of the late Broadway giant Adolph Green, and music by Curtis Moore) fit right in with the overall tone.
One of the many amusing lyrics is "I will not be stupid today," sung as everyone helps Tiffany become assertive. Of course, everything turns out well in the end. Stezen snaps out of his amnesia and he and Stephanie get together after all. Everyone, including the appreciative audience, leaves happy.
