THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, May 30, 1996 TAG: 9605300048
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E5 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Theater Review
SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, THEATER CRITIC
LENGTH: 57 lines
IS THERE LIFE for ``The Kathy and Mo Show'' without Kathy and Mo?
With Pam Good and Anne Morton taking over the 33 or so roles that make up this headlong rush into hilarity, the answer is a resounding, and somewhat surprising, ``Yes.''
The two actresses, under the sprightly and mischievous direction of Steve Koherr, have fashioned an audacious and thoroughly hip entertainment from this revue of comedy skits. It is the first bona fide hit for the Actors Theater of Virginia Beach in their new home.
Theater on the Mall, as it is called, is actually a vacant store in Pembroke Mall. For Moliere or even for the usual Broadway comedy, the ultra-intimate space can be awkward. For ``The Kathy and Mo Show,'' though, it is just right. The theater has been transformed into a comfy cabaret.
Kathy Najimy and Mo Gaffney wrote the dozen comedy skits for themselves and performed them off-Broadway and in Los Angeles (where I caught them) before they made the trek to cable TV. Najimy has achieved the most fame, lending that adorably pudgy face to roles as a nun opposite Whoopi Goldberg and a witch opposite Bette Midler. The improvisational and personal nature of the comedy offered no suggestion that the show might someday be played by others.
Pam and Anne, though, have enough gusto and brassiness to take the material and make it their own - or, rather, our own. The sketches are readily identifiable to us all. The authors have clearly chosen themes and issues that affect women, but they treat them in such outlandishly self-effacing ways that men can easily feel comfortable.
In the opener, the two are heavenly beings, complete with laughably threadbare wings, who look down on Earth and plan how things are to be - including sex. Their creation of males and females is markedly to the point (guys get the egos, girls get the babies).
Morton and Good take on both sexes in a variety of poses. Their characters go from gay bars to feminist bars, with quite a number of sobering stops in between. Good plays everything from Jeff, a macho teen date, to Prince Portfolio and a Third World farm worker. Morton, tossing her blonde curls, goes from teen Annette to country-Romeo Hank and a woman who longs to be Mrs. Kenny Rogers. There's not a misstep in the characterizations.
There is a spoof of Shakespeare, complete with sex changes. There is a visit with two simple-minded teens who traumatize about ``West Side Story.'' Surprisingly, none of the material seems dated.
The actresses are fully in step with the authors' attempt to see life's absurdities through a jaundiced, but revealing, mirror. ILLUSTRATION: THEATER REVIEW
``Parallel Lives: The Kathy and Mo Show''
What: The comedy by Kathy Najimy and Mo Gaffney
Where: Actors Theater of Virginia Beach in Pembroke Mall
Who: Pam Good and Anne Morton, directed by Steve Koherr
When: Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m., Sunday at 2 p.m.
Tickets: $10 ($8 for students, seniors and military, $5 for
children). by CNB