"Three Tall Women" is Worth the Trip

Theatre Review by Rosalind Lacy

It feels good to experience Edward Albee's "Three Tall Women."  This 1994 Pulitzer Prize-winning drama about dying is more abstract and mellow than his plays about cruelty and betrayal, like "The Zoo Story" and "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf," that shattered domestic tranquility in the 1960s.

In the second act of "Three Tall Women," the 26-year-old character, "C," grits her teeth and says to "B" and "A," her 52-and 92-year-old counterparts: "I'll never become you, either of you."  It's a lie because "C" will live through middle and old=age, the points in her life cycle "B" and "A" represent.  "A," "B" and "C" are three individual people yet the same.

At Cedar Lane Stage director Ed Starr's production smoothly flows and ebbs through these and other ironic moments in Albee's two-act drama, in which the characters occasionally address the audience as participants.

But what is especially uplifting and worthwhile about seeing this production is the fresh take an ensemble of three actresses bring to Albee's jarring repartee about the harshness of aging and dying.  Together the trio ultimately mirrors the subtle changes in one woman's life.  Their verbal fencing clears space for us to feel comfortable with the idea of death, allows us a laugh or two, and makes Albee's message concrete: Beware of death-in-life at all stages of life.  Don't freeze.  Seize the moment at every stage.

The 92-year-old whose soul is dissected is supposed to be Albee's mother.  The only life left to "A" (Leah Mazade) is her obsession with appearances or her memories, or her compulsive bigotry.  Once a horsewoman who  won silver cups for riding tall in her sidesaddle, "A" felt more passion for her horses, dogs and diamonds than she did for her husband.  This is the way the playwright pulls up short of rage by satirizing her.

Wisely not playing her as a cynical shrew, Leah Mazade, with rouged cheeks, humanizes "A" with childish sweetness.  The old lady's loss of control, her flaccid arm, disintegrating spine, and her emotional reaction to physical decline arouse our empathy.  "A" at 92 is more of a petulant clown, than a "tall" woman filled with pride.

Diana Jellinek, as "C," gives a clearly defined, at-moments impassioned performance, that becomes the myth of what it means to be defiantly young.  "C" is exuberantly committed to lovely clothes, dancing and having fun, meeting the man of her dreams, a stark contrast to denial of that kind of life by "A."

Then there's the transitional 52-year old "B" played with solid, understated conviction by Eve Young.  "This must be the happiest time: half of being adult done, the rest ahead of me... it's the only time you get a 360-degree view--see in all directions. Wow!  What a view!"

It may be too late for this mature woman to change her life, but her self-discovery in facing death and living is still important.

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