Harvey

Mary Chase’s Pulitzer Prize winning Harvey was written in 1944 and at 1,775 performances is one of the longest running plays on Broadway. It owes a lot to the screwball comedies of the thirties, think The Man Who Came to Dinner and plays of that ilk. Psycho-analysis became the rage in the U.S. at the time with plays and musicals alive with Sigmund Freud allusions. Chase cleverly tapped into this stream of social consciousness and was one of the first playwright’s to suggest the inmates of the asylum were more sane than the people who committed them.

The 1950 movie version of Harvey is fondly remembered for its ingratiating performance by James Stewart as the fond-of-a-tipple Elwood P. Dowd and his imaginary friend, the six-foot three and a half inch white rabbit he calls Harvey.

Despite being under-rehearsed and some opening night mishaps, Simon Corvan and Kathleen Yorston’s production for Growl Theatre brought colourful life to the piece. Best of the performances was Dom Tennison as Elwood and Martin Sta Ana as Dr. Sanderson. Tennison’s eye-twinkle and air of detachment nicely caught the charm of Dowd, whilst Sta Ana added some reality to the farce of the chaos going on around him. Wendy Peard’s daffy and mad sister Vita, looked smashing in her period outfits, but performance-wise too often fell into the OTT trap, Mikayla Hosking was a pretty Nurse Kelly, and Gabrielle Smith landed all her laughs in the cameo of Mrs Chauvenet.

Winner of the night was playwright Mary Chase, whose 72-year-old screwball-comedy can still provoke a chuckle or two.

Peter Pinne