The Arts / Reviews

Clinton Showboat goes over the top with ‘Millie’

By David Burke | Wednesday, June 04, 2008 | () comments

Allison Luff has the title role in Clinton Area Showboat Theatre’s “Thoroughly Modern Millie.” (contributed photo)

If you go

What: “Thoroughly Modern Millie”

When: Through June 15; performances at 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays and 3:30 p.m. Wednesdays and Sundays

Where: Clinton Area Showboat Theatre, 303 Riverview Drive, Clinton, Iowa

How much: $18 adults, $12 for students 13-18 years old, $8 for children 12 years and younger

Information: (563) 242-6760 or ClintonShowboat.org on the Web

Seventy-five years before Carrie Bradshaw, there was Millie Dillmount.

Like her “Sex and the City” progeny, the title character in “Thoroughly Modern Millie” is seeking success both professionally and personally in New York, with those lines occasionally intersecting. Always dreaming of a better life, at least they both have a group of female friends to inspire them to move on.

While “Sex in the City” has moved from TV sets to the cinemas, “Millie” is on stage at the Clinton Area Showboat Theatre.

In the title role, Alison Luff both charms and dazzles. She plays the doe-eyed innocent well, seemingly channeling a young Mary Tyler Moore (who, coincidentally, played a supporting role in the 1967 film version of “Millie”).

Fresh off the bus from Kansas, Millie is mugged in a melee and then settles at a fleabag hotel before finding a job as a stenographer. She’s hoping boss Trevor Greydon (Joshua Estrada) will be her Mr. Big personally as well as professionally, to some comic consequences.

But there to throw a wrench in the plans is Jimmy Smith (Zach Borja), a ne’er-do-well who’s the first person in New York to befriend her.

It doesn’t quite become a love triangle as much as a parallelogram when Greydon and Jimmy both are also attracted to Dorothy Brown (Monica Bradley, in Moore’s movie role), a slumming socialite.

Add to this a subplot in which an actress-turned-hotel manager (Dallas Milholland) kidnaps orphaned female hotel guests to sell them into “white slavery” with the help of two Chinese henchmen she employs (Nick Divarco, Mitchell Greco).

Unlike the comparative subtleness of movie or TV, director Craig A. Miller seems to have given carte blanche to all the performers to go over the top. The only exception is Bradley, whose Dorothy is refreshingly calm in comparison with her fellow cast members. Luff’s Millie seems to be the only one with justification for exaggeration, while much of the scenery chewing is done by Milholland’s Mrs. Meers, incognito in kabuki makeup and an intentionally bad Asian accent that interchanges the “l” and “r” sounds. (And why does the script deem Asians acceptable for this stereotyping?)

Estrada is smooth as Millie’s dreamy boss, but Borja has too much of a babyface and is too immature of an actor to carry out the role of romantic lead.

Miller’s casting is colorblind: An African-American actress dreads the “white slavery” in an early scene, and Mikeietta Williams as a torch singer in a later scene leads up to one of the production’s biggest laughs.

Jesse Dreikosen’s minimalistic set serves several scenes well and provides a space to project the dialogue of the henchmen. Adam Wiggins’ music direction and the choreography of Meghan Hakes (who also has the role of a Millie friend and columnist Dorothy Parker) add to the fun of the show.

It’s all light and frothy summer entertainment, with Luff’s character giving “Millie” the most life.

David Burke can be contacted at (563) 383-2400 or dburke@qctimes.com. Comment on this review at qctimes.com.