'Sleuth' stars find comfort in their trust

 

 

By Richard Duckett TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

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Phil Killbourne and Chip Phillips in "Sleuth" (TRINA M. HOLUB)

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'Sleuth'

Where: Worcester Foothills Theater Company, Commercial Street, Worcester.

 

When: Now through Nov. 20.

 

How much: $26.50 to $35, depending on performance. Box office, (508) 754-4018.

 

Phil Kilbourne and Chip Phillips have never acted together before, but it has been helpful to their roles in the Worcester Foothills Theatre Company production of 'Sleuth' that they've been getting along.

 

Kilbourne noted that a clue to a successful mystery-suspense is if the actors playing the lead protagonists like each other especially if they are portraying antagonists on stage.

 

'There's an animosity which you can't really get on the stage unless you like him,' Kilbourne said of swapping the barbs with an actor. The reason is, 'You have to be able to have trust. I think when I met Chip I said, 'Yeah, this is going to work out.' '

 

Phillips, the quieter one of the two, nodded his head.

 

In 'Sleuth' (now running at Foothills through Nov. 20), Kilbourne plays Andrew Wyke, a famous mystery writer who may well be past his prime as he sounds off with his jaundiced British prejudices. And yet Andrew has invited Milo Tindle (played by Chip Phillips) to his English country home where he now lives alone even though the guest is half-Italian and has been sleeping with his wife. Actually, it doesn't seem that Andrew minds (he has a mistress of his own). In fact, Andrew has a helpful suggestion for the impoverished Milo namely that he stage a burglary at the house and make off with some expensive jewels. Milo will be able to sell them at a good price, while Andrew, who could use some money himself, can cash in on the insurance policy.

 

But don't be fooled. A game is being played here one character against the other. And as the play unfolds it becomes an increasingly dangerous game of who is fooling whom. And yes, a police inspector will call.

 

'They're really chewy pieces,' Kilbourne said of the devious characters Shaffer created. 'All of the roles are chewy. It's very well written and it flies all over the place.'

 

Which should make for an absorbing time for the audience as supported by the evidence of the play's 35-year life span ('Sleuth' was also made into a delicious 1972 movie starring Laurence Olivier and Michael Caine.)

 

'You really can turn the tables on them (audience members),' Kilbourne said. 'But it's a fine line. You play the game with the audience as well as the character. The actor has to fool the audience, making sure they understand that they don't understand. It's a juggling act. If you overdo people will say, 'Oh that's just silly.' '

 

Still, in this case 'Sleuth' seemed to be playing out. Kilbourne and Phillips were being interviewed at Foothills the day after the first preview performance.

 

'The first preview went really well,' Kilbourne said. Then he tapped his hand against some nearby woodwork. 'The show can be a technical nightmare, but, knock on wood, the technical stuff worked out every well last night.'

 

A three-and-a-half star review was in the production's future which no doubt helped the rapport between Kilbourne and Phillips.

 

And yet, as was alluded to earlier, the two actors are quite different personalities. Kilbourne, 53, has a wry, dry sense of humor and gave the longer answers to most of the questions asked. In contrast, Phillips, 48, seemed quite shy (albeit, like Kilbourne, perfectly amiable). But if Kilbourne seemed slightly more at home during the interview, compared with Phillips, he's a relative stranger to Foothills. Kilbourne has been seen at Foothills before in the 2001 production of 'Don't Dress for Dinner.' However, that pales compared to Phillips, who has been in 12 previous Foothills shows.

 

His last one prior to 'Sleuth' was 'A Christmas Carol' in 2000.

 

Phillips is glad to be back.

 

'Worcester always seems to come along and save my bacon,' Phillips remarked. He recalled that earlier in his career he had moved to California for 'a miserable year-and-a-half' and then came back East after being cast in a Foothills show. 'It was nice to be with a community of actors and a supportive atmosphere. So it feels like coming home,' he said.

 

Home for Phillips had been Boston until he moved to New York City two years ago. His Foothills credits have included 'From Berlin to Broadway with Kurt Weill' and 'On Golden Pond.' In Boston he had an 18-month run in 'I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change.'

 

The change to New York has not been totally perfect.

 

'New York's tough,' Phillips acknowledged. 'If I work, I work out of town. It's hard. I barely see my wife these days.'

 

Nevertheless, the reason for moving to New York was to explore a 'bigger market, a wider net,' Phillips said. His wife, actress and stand-up comedienne Julie Perkins, has benefited from that and been busy. And living in New York can offer some unusual opportunities. On his day off from 'Sleuth' last week, Phillips had a gig as an extra watching the lithe dancers at the 'Bada Ding' club during the shooting of an episode of 'The Sopranos.'

 

Speaking of Soprano-land, Kilbourne is originally from New Jersey but lived in Boston several years as a student and actor. A re-connection with his 'high school sweetheart,' Marysue Moses, led to marriage and relocation to St. Paul, where his wife runs Theatre at Work, which offers theater-based training on social issues such as sexual harassment and violence in the work place.

 

Over the years Kilbourne said he has done a lot of theater work for director Jack Neary, who directs the Foothills production of 'Sleuth.'

 

'I've done a lot of murder mystery with Jack. I've killed people for Jack a lot. I'm his go-to guy for slaughter,' Kilbourne deadpanned.

 

He had also played Andrew in 'Sleuth' six years ago. Neary remembered and gave him a call. Kilbourne is heavily involved as an actor with Theatre at Work but the dates for 'Sleuth' worked out.

 

'I had done the show before. It was perfect.'

 

Neary had been talking to Phillips, and invited him to audition.

 

'It worked out well,' Phillips said.

 

So when they were asked how they felt about returning to Foothills and appearing in 'Sleuth,' there was no mystery about it.

 

'I love coming back to New England,' Kilbourne said. 'It seems in Minnesota there's the crass theater and highly experimental theater. And the good theater only a few theaters practice it. I like it that Foothills practices good theater and is a popular theater.'

 

Phillips nodded in agreement.

                                   

                 

          

Tuesday, November 1, 2005

 Strong showings by actors help witty SLEUTH to shine

THEATER REVIEW

By Paul Kolas TELEGRAM & GAZETTE REVIEWER

 

ÔSleuth'

 

Written by Anthony Shaffer, directed by Jack Neary. Presented by Foothills Theatre Company, 100 Front St., Worcester. Performances on Thursdays at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m., Fridays at 8 p.m., Saturdays at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m., and Sundays at 2 p.m. through Nov. 24. Tickets: $26.50-$32. Call (508) 754-4018 for reservations, or book online at www.foothillstheatre.com.

With Phil Kilbourne, Chip Phillips, Philip Farrar, Harold K. Newman and Roger Purnell.

 

 

 

 

 

WORCESTER'Sleuth' is a play fecund with sly wit and deadly motivation, engineered to showcase the elegantly creative perversity human nature is capable of, a psychological mind game that at its fundamentally British core stokes the clashing fires between upper and working class mores, as represented respectively by Andrew Wyke and Milo Tindle. Jack Neary, who has directed several Foothills Theatre Company productions, has guided Phil Kilbourne (Andrew) and Chip Phillips (Milo) skillfully through the deceitful thickets of Anthony Shaffer's work in Foothills' latest offering, which played to a disconcertingly sparse audience on Sunday.

'Sleuth' is a high wire act that requires resourceful and focused actors to pull it off with elan, attributes thankfully found in the fully engaging performances of Kilbourne and Phillips.

Any summation of 'Sleuth' must be truncated in the extreme due to the labyrinthine nature of its plot, but there are a few essential details that can be divulged without criminality. Andrew is a wealthy mystery novel writer who has invited his wife's lover (Milo) to his ornately rustic home to meet him and propose a plan to provide the financially struggling Milo with a means of supporting her in the luxurious lifestyle she's accustomed to. Yes, you read that correctly.

It seems that Andrew is all too willing to give his high-maintenance wife away. To wit: Milo will 'steal' Margarite's jewels, sell them to a fence Andrew knows in Amsterdam that will give Milo full value for them (90,000 pounds), Andrew then pocketing the insurance money. Milo, of course, is suspicious of all this, thinking that Andrew is really a vengeful husband plotting a frame-up.

As the first act comes to a close, with Milo attired in a clown's costume Andrew has supplied for the mock burglary, those who have never seen 'Sleuth,' either onstage or the 1972 film with Sir Laurence Oliver and Michael Caine, will be pondering what lies in store in the second act after a gunshot turns a brainy duel into a seemingly deadly affair.

There is at times an irritating air of contrivance about the way Shaffer sets up his adversaries, like pieces on a chessboard, but there are also shards of indignation ripping through the wonderfully literate patter. There is no doubt he sides with Milo on matters of class.

Milo symbolizes the upstart working man, half Jewish, half Italian, who has dared to insinuate himself into the upper strata of British society by taking Andrew's wife from him. Milo owns a travel agency but is financially adrift, and can certainly use the lure of Andrew's scheme to boost not only his bank account, but, far more importantly, to be worthy of supporting Margarite.

Phillips does what he must in the role of Milo: he plays him shrewdly on the intellectual defensive in the first act, allowing Andrew to have free-flowing discourse of all his brilliantly devious ideas.

It's passive-aggressive acting that evolves into inventive pathological calculation as the 'game' progresses. If all that sounds nebulous, it's meant to be.

After all, this is a mystery reliant on surprise.

But there is no mystery about Phillips' insightful performance, nor Kilbourne's extra dry martini portrayal of Andrew. Here's a man nauseatingly in love with himself, supremely insouciant to the feelings of anyone else. It's a pleasure to watch Kilbourne confidently toy with Phillips, flaunting his arrogance with acidly delivered retorts, often mocking the police or bragging about his sexual prowess with his mistress Taya.

As he says in one of the play's many great lines: 'sex is the game, marriage is the penalty.'

As the battle lines shift and Andrew is forced into frantic reappraisal of his master plan, Kilbourne does an excellent job of backpeddling with damage control cunning, like an aging boxer against the ropes who has underestimated his opponent and is forced to employ whatever means necessary to stay in the game and preserve his sense of honor.

Both actors keep the dialogue bouncing back and forth like a well-played tennis match.

Philip Farrar (Inspector Doppler), Harold K. Newman (Detective Sergeant Tarrant), and Roger Purnell (Police Constable Higgs) are little more than window dressing for the thespian acrobatics of the two lead roles, but one needs to see the show to know exactly what that means.

James Wolk's scenic design is well worth noting, a sprawling upstairs-downstairs melange of bookshelves, closets and a laughing, one-legged sailor.