Diana Sheehan as "Little" Edie. Photo by Mark Oristano.

Kimberly Whalen and Matt Moore. Photo by Mark Oristano.

Pam Dougherty and Diana Sheehan. Photo by Mark Oristano.

The "Grey Gardens" company. Photo by Mark Oristano.

Diana Sheehan and Gary Floyd. Photo by Mark Oristano.

  

Grey Gardens

by Scott Frankel (music)
Michael Korie (lyrics)
Doug Wright (book)

Presented by WaterTower Theatre

October 2 - November 1

at WaterTower Theatre
15650 Addison Road
Addison, TX 75001

$25-$40

7:30pm Wednesdays & Thursdays; 8pm Fridays & Saturdays; 2pm Sundays & Oct 24

It is rare to find a performance that is so many kinds of wonderful all at once, like different points of light reflecting from one tarnished but exquisite gemstone. That describes the turn by Diana Sheehan in WaterTower Theatre's area premiere of the musical Grey Gardens.

Sheehan is breathtaking. She's funny in traditional and tragic ways; she can exhibit subtle tones and also play an expansive range; and she sings a difficult and demanding role with remarkable clarity, emotion and vocal skill. It is now the performance of the year.

And the best part about it is that this isn't just the Diana Sheehan Show. WaterTower's production, directed by Terry Martin, is a fully realized, unforgettable production.

Grey Gardens, with music by Scott Frankel, lyrics by Michael Korie and book by Dallas native and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Doug Wright (I Am My Own Wife), is based on the 1975 cult documentary of the same name by the Maysles Brothers. Or, at least half of it is.

The film took us into the world of Edith Bouvier Beale and "Little" Edie Beale, the aunt and cousin of Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, who were living in squalid conditions in a rundown manor in East Hampton, New York, in 1973. (The recent Emmy-winning HBO film was also based on the doc.)

The second act of the musical adheres to the film, while the first act imagines what might have happened some 30 years earlier that could have led to such a wonderful train-wreck of once-removed American royalty.

In 1941, Sheehan plays Edith, a domineering mother who might be more closely related to Amanda Wingfield than to Janet Norton Lee. She's a singer, but was never able to make a big career of it. Still, she's satisfied with performing with her gay accompanist pal, Gould (Gary Floyd), and even plans to make herself the star of her daughter "Little" Edie's (Kimberly Whalen) wedding to the dashing Joe Patrick Kennedy Jr. (Matt Moore). That is, until she ambushes those impending nuptials altogether.

This is where we also meet the young Jackie (adorable Kaylee King) and her little sister Lee (Dani Altshuler, also too-cute), who are staying at the estate for the wedding; as well as Edith's disapproving father J.V. "Major" Bouvier (R Bruce Elliott) and Edith's servant, Brooks (Kenne Sparks).

The heartbreak in this home, passed from generation to generation, is palpable.

In the second act, Sheehan is now "Little" Edie as an oddball adult, living with her equally cuckoo mom Edith (now played by Pam Dougherty). They're hermits in a dilapidated manse that's described as a giant litter box, what with the dozens of stray cats and a few raccoons. The other actors from act one play various chorus roles, with Elliott as positive thinker Norman Vincent Peale and Moore as a delivery boy with whom Edith has a bizarre maternal infatuation.

The 1973 portion kicks off with the show's two best songs, Edie's The Revolutionary Costume for Today and Edith's The Cake I Had. But this musical is full of tuneful numbers, easily some of the most memorable of any new musical from this decade.

Martin's cast sings them with finesse. Music director James McQuillen not only gets fine work from Sheehan and the soloists, but the ensemble numbers sound stunning, too. Acting throughout the show is strong; Whalen and Floyd are at the top of their games, Elliott is his usual greatness and Moore gives a standout turn as two very different characters.

The production looks like a million bucks. Christopher Pickart's multilevel set of the dilapidated manor transforms WaterTower's stage. Aaron Patrick Turner's costumes, which are faithful to the film in the second act, are gorgeous in the first act, too, especially Edith's party gown.

Sheehan looks amazing in it, and even more fabulous in the leopard one-piece swimsuit in the second half. The only things that take your eye off of her outfits are the acting performances by her and Dougherty, especially as they spend a good chunk of the second act laying in their side-by-side twin beds in a bedroom trashed with empty cat food cans.

They're both utterly heartbreaking. During Edith's performance of The Cake I Had, when Edie says "I'll probably be an old maid until I die, I'll sit around with cats the rest of my life," it warrants an uncomfortable laugh, followed by deepest empathy that might not accompany any random crazy cat lady. Knowing that this story comes from one of America's great dynasties is the bitter icing on the cake.

That's a cake that Edith and Edie have had and devoured. And we're all left wanting more.