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The Tufts Daily
Where you read it first | Wednesday, February 19, 2025

Anything but a day at the beach

The Huntington Theatre Company continued its 20th anniversary season last week with the New England premiere of Betty's Summer Vacation, an outrageous and humorous satire written by American playwright Christopher Durang and directed by the Huntington's Artistic Director Nicholas Martin.

The play starts off innocently enough - two young working girls arrive at a summer cottage by the shore, eagerly anticipating what they hope will be a relaxing break from the city. Betty and Trudy make themselves at home in the brightly-lit living room and speculate as to what their other roommates will be like.

Sounds unassuming enough so far, right? Enter Keith, the hatbox-carrying, shovel-toting serial killer. "I hope you're not a serial killer, and that shovel's for burying people. And what's in the hatbox? Not a head, I hope," questions Trudy. Not so unassuming anymore.

Buck, whose prime interests are drinking and having sex, arrives next. The cottage's landlord Mrs. Siezmagraff, who later reveals herself to be Trudy's mother, rounds out the group with her drunken antics.

And, of course... the voices in the ceiling. When the play begins, they limit their intrusion to laughing periodically. As Act I progresses, they begin explaining the reasons for their laughter and ordering around the cottage guests. In the second act, the voices finally reveal themselves and fall from the sky, causing the ultimate demise of all the visitors with the exception of Betty.

Durang's original intent in writing this work was to create a "friendly, sunny play." He strays as far from that concept as possible in this dark comedy - Betty's Summer Vacation captures a summer vacation gone terribly wrong, not "fond childhood memories of vacations spent with my parents at the New Jersey." From molestation to serial killers to rapists, there's not much else that could happen at the modest seashore cottage to ruin the pleasant vacation envisioned by Betty and Trudy when they first arrive. Despite these serious issues tackled by the play, it is one of the most humorous debuts to hit the stage at the Huntington Theatre. The play owes its perfect balance between earnestness and hilarity to the cast.

Colleen Quinlan captures the various nuances of Trudy's character, conveying to the audience her vulnerability. Abused as a child by her father and rejected by her mother, Trudy tries to compensate for her fears by talking incessantly. Quinlan successfully makes the character endearing, as opposed to simply annoying. Nat DeWolf gives an equally stellar performance as Keith. Like Trudy, Keith was also abused as a child. His methods of dealing with it, however, are very different - rather than being overly chatty, he is socially withdrawn and resorts to killing people. Like Quinlian, DeWolf inspires sympathy for Keith despite his propensity for cutting off the heads of innocent people.

Jessica Stone, who has previously appeared in both Broadway and off-Broadway productions, plays Betty. While she is simultaneously humorous and endearing, her performance was less impressive than the other actors - especially given her title role in the play. However, her blood-curdling scream saves her performance.

Andrea Martin is the undeniable star of Betty's Summer Vacation. Recognizable from her days on Sesame Street, her portrayal of Mrs. Siezmagraff is nothing short of spectacular. She successfully steals every scene. When she calls the police to inform them of the death of the derelict dinner guest Mr. Vanislaw, her calm on the phone is both unnerving and hilarious. When the voices descend from the ceiling they demand that the guests act out a trial in Court TV-fashion, Martin plays Mrs. Seizmagraff, the attorney, and the housekeeper all at once; the effect is nothing short of laugh-out-loud funny.

The greatest weakness of Betty's Summer Vacation is the conclusion, which fails to flow with the rest of the play. While it returns to the theme of the sound of the water that is stressed earlier in the play, the serious turn that it takes seems very unnatural. Throughout the play, serious issues are tempered with humor. The lack of humor in the final scene makes the audience uncomfortable, as it has become accustomed to the combination of the solemnity with hilarity at the core of Betty's Summer Vacation. The shift is awkward, unexpected, and unnecessary.

Despite the somewhat disappointing final scene, Betty's Summer Vacation is still worth a trip to the Huntington for plenty of laughs. It makes all your miserable vacations with your parents seem mild in comparison.

Betty's Summer Vacation

runs at the Huntington Theatre through Nov. 25. Tickets cost $12 - $58. Contact the Box Office (617-266-0800) or Ticketmaster (617-931-ARTS) for tickets.