Tears and a Standing Ovation

By Phaidra Yunker
Staff Writer

Fargo Moorehead Community Theatre is the perfect intimate setting for Robert Harling’s funny and personal “Steel Magnolias.” Many are familiar with the 1989 movie adaptation of Harling’s script staring Sally Field, Julia Roberts, Shirley McLain, Olympia Dukakis, Dolly Paton, and Daryl Hannah. It’s a fantastic movie, and it’s a fantastic play. There is a reason that so many women jump at the chance to play these characters, these “Steel Magnolias.”

Though often considered a “chick play” (and admittedly, there’s not a single man on stage, despite the Hollywood expansion of the cast), this production is likable, funny, and heart-wrenching, regardless of the audience’s gender.

Set in a beauty salon in rural Louisiana, the play covers nearly three years in the lives of six women. Each of the four scenes takes place many months after the last, and thanks to some very smooth dialogue, we learn everything that has gone on in each of the women‘s lives between scenes.

As the play begins, it’s Shelby’s (Jackie Arness) wedding day. Her mom, M’Lynn (Charlene Hudgins), is proud as a Southern woman can be, but worried about her headstrong daughter. Shelby is diabetic, and doctors have said she shouldn’t have children—but when, in a later scene, she announces she has become pregnant, she insists she will have the baby no matter what. M’Lynn struggles throughout the play with her “mother knows best” attitude toward her only daughter. There are more surprises and heartaches in store, and the play shows how these women use humor and love to work through them.

Director Jean Wilhemi has assembled a strong cast of women for the FMCT production. Though young, Arness is well-cast as Shelby, as is Hudgins as her mother. Charlene deftly handles the emotional climax of the play, bringing the audience to tears (even the men), and to their feet in a standing ovation.

Jane Barnstuble is hysterical as the cantankerous old spitfire Ouiser, spitting out lines like, “The only reason people are nice to me is that I have more money than God.”

In fact, this play thrives on that sort of attitude-heavy Southern talk. Alone in the beauty parlor these women are honest and scathingly astute in their descriptions of other towns-folk. The one-liners are vividly memorable and earn many laughs. Someone is described as not having opposable thumbs; someone says she looks “like a dog’s dinner”; a husband is said to be so confused, “he doesn’t know whether to scratch his watch or wind his butt”; someone else is troubled, but it’s “nothing a handful of prescription drugs couldn’t cure.”
Andrea Peterson as salon-owner Truvy, Kari Thestling as rich widow Clariee, and Cora Joe Anderson as new-girl-in-town Annelle round out the cast. Anderson’s Annelle is delightfully odd, transforming her demeanor and appearance throughout the play as Annelle searches for her identity.

Peterson’s Truvy is smart and sassy, a hopeless romantic, who strives for a better relationship with her husband and sons. Thestling is lovely as Clariee, who despite (or perhaps because of) her past as a perfect politician’s wife, has a sharp tongue and a ready wit.

One cannot help but compare the play to the movie and Wilhelmi chooses to acknowledge this early on in the play. When in the first scene M’Lynn suggests Shelby choose an up do similar to that of Julia Roberts for her wedding day hair, Shelby recommends that the picture be burned instead. This frank recognition of the powerful film allows the audience to move on. There is a collective giggle and a sigh, as if everyone, cast included, is thinking “Okay, we know that there was a movie. We’ve all seen it, and we all know we love it. Now we can watch this play and stop comparing.” The result is that the audience stops thinking of the actress’s performances in reference to the film. We are allowed to fall in love with this particular vision of the play.

If there is a criticism of FMCT’s “Steel Magnolia’s,” it is the choice to partially modernize the production but not the text. Shelby shares a picture of her son with the ladies via her cell phone, yet describes her fiancé as “swell.” The costumes are modern but the hair references are very 1980’s, as in “the bigger the better.” It’s a little thing, yet when 2010 sneaks in, it’s a bit jarring. When the ladies are discussing medical treatments that were current 30 years ago, one can’t help but think, “If this is 2010, can’t the doctors do more for Shelby?” With the exception of the Julia Roberts allusion, it does nothing for the production, yet the cast does its best to adapt to the changes, and most audience members play along.

All in all this is a fantastic production of a beloved script that depicts the strength of the female spirit. If you loved the film, go see the play—you will enjoy it. If you’ve never seen the film, all the more reason. It is an ideal play for mothers, daughters, best friends, and the men that love them. Fargo-Moorhead audiences should make time to attend.

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What: “Steel Magnolias”
Where: F-M Community Theatre
April 22, 23, 24, 7:30pm, April 25 at 2pm
Info: 701.235.6778