Bootstraps Comedy Theater has reprised The Boxer by Bootstraps' co-artistic director, Matt Lyle. The Boxer was the hit of this summer's Festival of Independent Theaters at the BathHouse Cultural Center. This time around, it ran November 15-December 2, 2007 at the Rosewood Center for Family Arts with the original cast.
The Boxer is a one-hour play without words in the style of Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton. It's set in the early 1900s on the streets, where making a living is difficult at best and even moreso for a woman if she wants to retain her virtue.
Our heroine, Velma (Kim Lyle), disguised as a man, gets a job on a construction crew. When "he" doesn't join in the camaraderie at the local bar by pinching the waitress' bottom, he is jeered as a pansy and drummed out of the ranks.
So what's a "guy" to do? As "he"'s walking down the street, Velma sees a big guy (Joel McDonald) knock a little guy (Jeff Swearingen) senseless; so our "hero" comes to the little guy's defense and knocks the big guy for a loop, rendering him unconscious. Problem is the little guy is the titular boxer, and the big guy is his trainer. The Boxer is getting ready for his Big Fight with the Bavarian Beast (Ben Bryant). What to do now?
Velma steps into the breach to become the trainer. The boxer must win the fight to get money for his ailing mother (shown on screen in a hysterically funny vignette) with appropriate music selected by B. Wolf and played live downstage right by Wolf and Johnny Sequenzia.
As the tale unfolds, we see the story flashed in words, in silent-screen mode, on an upstage screen including a very funny training sequence between Swearingen and a gorilla.
The more hip crowd can recognize the "Rocky" theme music, while the old-timers hear such early 20th-century songs as "While Strolling Through the Park One Day," "I'm Only a Bird in a Gilded Cage," "Roll Out The Barrel,", and an old sea shanty. A very funny shtick occurs when Velma falls for the Boxer (who doesn't know she's a she) to the strains of "They're Playing Songs of Love, but Not for Me." Numbers from Oklahoma! and My Fair Lady are seamlessly woven into the plot.
The Boxer is the cleverest show of the year to grace any Dallas stage. Kim Lyle is an extraordinarily talented mime, and Swearingen knows how to take a fall. The balance of the cast is excellent. The Boxer is a sure-fire hit.
