By Vivien Latham Special to the Ojai Valley News Oct 13, 2022
What happens when two women are stranded at an airport during a thunderstorm, waiting for their flights while all the airports are temporarily shut down? Can two middle-aged women — one from a blue state, one from a red state — share a table without driving each other crazy?
If that sounds like the opening lines of a female version of “The Odd Couple,” that’s because the premise of Joe Calarco’s play, at first glance, seems like the distaff version of Neil Simon’s play. But Calarco’s play isn’t just about the comical interaction of two different women, but of the similarities between them.
Politically and culturally, the two women seem like polar opposites. Margaret (Jill Dolan) is sitting quietly at a table, stylishly dressed and daintily sipping a glass of wine. Her quiet solitude is suddenly interrupted when down the aisle comes Patty (Sindy McKay) chattering away on her cell phone, blissfully unaware of her annoying intrusion.
Patty is rather sloppily dressed in jeans, a loose gray top, and a large red fanny pack. With no other seats available, Margaret reluctantly invites this noisy newcomer to share her table, and in no time at all, Patty’s things are scattered all over the table as she rambles nonstop. Margaret is clearly annoyed as Patty buzzes on like a gnat around her, but eventually allows her to stay.
With nowhere else to go, the two women slowly start to talk, their conversation becoming more revealing and more intimate as they share aspects of their marriages, their children, their education, their fears, and their dreams.
Although there are a few moments in which their world views clash, the two women (and the audience) discover that they have more in common than they realized.
The play takes place in a waiting area at the Reagan National Airport. Designed by Tom Eubanks (from the original production at the Elite Theatre Company), the look is stylistically sparing. The occasional airport announcements are humorous and whimsical, adding a surreal touch of comedy to the show.
Jill Dolan and Sindy McKay, two veterans of Ventura County theaters for many years, play their respective roles with humor, verve, vulnerability, compassion, and depth. The women they portray aren’t just caricatures of the red state/blue state culture wars, but real human beings with all of the inherent strengths and frailties.
Calarco wrote the play after 9/11, stating: “At a time when civil discourse seems to be dead in America, I wanted to write a play where people from very different backgrounds are forced by circumstance to sit and simply talk and listen to one another. Even if neither woman’s world view necessarily changes, maybe in the future it will be harder for either of them to demonize someone who thinks differently than they do.”
Calarco’s play shows what can happen when people stop shouting at each other and start listening to each other. A valuable lesson, especially during these daunting and angst-ridden times, when people are often focused on what divides us instead of what brings us together.