This adaptation of Robert Coover's pungently satirical short story shows that literature and theater can be mixed successfully. Utilizing a narrator (Pearsall) and seven gifted actors who have been choreographed in seamless fashion by Vincent D'Altorio, reality and fantasy are explored -- make that deconstructed -- by D'Altorio in contrapuntal fashion. Triggered by the arrival of a beautiful young babysitter (Rhonda Patterson) at the home of the Tuckers, the story goes back and forth in time to dramatize the impact her budding sexuality has on everyone. We become privy to the characters' inner thoughts, almost all of which clash with their outer actions; in that dialectic lies much enjoyment, if only because we are privy to secret and forbidden desires. Mr. Tucker (John Eric Montana), for example, shows a bland, boozy face to the world, yet inside he lusts for the nubile teenager and despises his fat wife (Winifred Freedman). The latter has her own hidden agenda (fear of being put in an old-age home) which is compounded by struggles with her copious flesh and an over-constricting girdle. The Tucker children (Darin Toonder & T.L. Brooke) are loud, spoiled little brats who delight in tormenting the sitter. The sitter's boyfriend, Jack (Keith Bogart), and his slime-ball pal Mark (James C. Leary) aren't much better, driven as they are by testosterone- powered urges to batter and rape.
The other threads woven into this bleak human tapestry are mind-numbing television and sentimental popsong. America is a kind of crazy house, the play says, but -- like the babysitter herself -- we are caught up in its madness and can't escape from it.
