Have yourself a rollicking, perverse, slapstick Christmas with Book-It Repertory's new production of Owen Meany's Christmas Pageant, based upon chapter four of John Irving's novel A Prayer for Owen Meany. It tells the enchanting tale of the valiant attempts of the Reverend Wiggins and his wife - of Christ Church of Gravesend, New Hampshire - to put on a normal, humble Christmas pageant but who, through no fault of their own, find themselves trapped in a chapter of a John Irving novel, and Irving won't be done with them till he's wrenched every drop of pious ooze from their trembling bodies.
Never has more gone wrong with a Christmas theatrical production. It's almost a Jerry Lewis movie, the laughs keep rolling in, but Irving is smarter than that, and the whole affair is drenched in sadness due to the strange relationship of the narrator, Johnny, to his best friend, the diminutive and irritating Owen Meany.
According to the book, not only was Owen's growth stunted to under five feet, he damaged his larynx and has to shout through his nose in a wrecked voice. I can't imagine a harder acting job than having to play someone completely irritating to everyone IN the play but not so much to everyone in the audience who better not hate the main character. Josh Aaseng pulls off this complicated task with a simple falsetto and a lot of comic dexterity.
Connor Toms, from Book-It's previous production of Irving's The Cider House Rules, is particularly good as Johnny, the narrator with a hole in his heart he never talks about.
It seems one day they were playing baseball when Owen hit a high fly ball that killed Johnny's mother, one of the many of random acts that appear throughout Irving's books in his deep-rooted philosophy that life is uncontrollable.
When you've got a line in a book like "Simon and I never spoke of my mother because it was just too painful," it's too important to leave out and yet impossible to delegate to dialogue. Once again, Book-it provides the perfect solution by having Johnny say the line from the book directly to the audience.
This isn't your mother's Christmas Pageant. My favorite moment was when the little baby Jesus had to throw cues at the angel of the lord who forgot his lines - just the way it really happened. If you're looking for reverence, look elsewhere. If you're looking for the most subversive Christmas play ever, get your tickets now.
The program for the show.
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