Los Altos creation of “Magnolias” is a bit as well colourful

Robert Harling’s 1987 dramady “Steel Magnolias” is intended to pull each laughter and melancholy from an viewers. At any time since it was tailored into a movie in 1988, the play been a most loved for group theaters to create.

In some means, director Lee Ann Payne captures that essence in Los Altos Stage Company’s recent manufacturing, but there are also some points that sense off. Among them are Sharon Peng’s costumes. Harling’s script phone calls for bride-to-be Shelby (a sympathetic Michelle Skinner) to don pink.

“It’s my shade,” she states quite a few instances, and she even wears pink eye makeup to demonstrate it. However from the viewers it seems that a lot of of Shelby’s dresses are peach instead than pink.

Truvy’s Splendor Location is the center of town for the girls of Chinquapin, a fictional northwestern Louisiana parish. Truvy’s is a put to for them to both nurture friendships and vent about conflicts in their personal lives.

Truvy’s to start with-act costume also seems mistaken. Truvy (a finely etched overall performance by Cindy Weisberg) enjoys gaudy outfits, but she’s also very pleased of her determine. Yet her Act 1 outfit is these types of a mismatched mixture of flowing blues and purples that not even a flower boy or girl would be caught useless putting on it.

Clairee (Christine Hold out) is the mayor’s widow, but Peng attire her in a dazzling turquoise jacket and purple blouse, a peculiar mixture not befitting of her standing in the group.

Scenic designer Seafus Smith has developed an beautiful but expansive splendor store. When one particular solid member sits on a sofa on the right aspect of the phase and the person she’s speaking with sits at the manicure station at the far remaining, audiences might really feel as if they are viewing a tennis match.

The cast of 6 all does a great task of creating their roles believable, though Amanda Nguyen as Annelle, an 18-12 months-outdated who is new in city, is a bit of an enigma. In Act 1, she looks frightened and determined for a task, which Truvy presents her. By Act 2, Annelle has turn into a born-yet again Christian, and Nguyen expresses this adjust by performing stiffly.

Patricia Tyler, as the cantankerous Ouiser, doesn’t make an physical appearance until the close of Act 1. Sporting a casual shirt and denims, she saunters in and straight away starts off complaining. Tyler does crabbiness nicely, and she and Clairee get into a heated exchange in the second act that‘s enjoyment to watch.

The enjoy takes position over a few several years, and when it promotions with some severe realities, humor usually arrives through, as when Shelby describes her two most loved shades of nail polish: “Blush and bashful – the two shades of pink.”

“Steel Magnolia” operates by June 12 at Bus Barn Theater in Los Altos. Tickets are $32 -$40 at www.losaltosstage.org or 650-941-0551.

All COVID protocols are staying adopted, and masks are essential inside of the theater.