Theater Review / Fringe Theater’s Shirley Valentine a one-woman tour de force 

By Joanna Brady

Shirley Valentine is a hilarious comedy about a middle-aged housewife living in Liverpool. Written by Willy Russell in the 1980s, it was a mega hit at the time, with numerous productions on both sides of the pond before it appeared on the screen. Staging this work is yet another coup for Key West’s Fringe Theater, which has brought us a variety of entertaining plays this season.

What makes Shirley Valentine such a challenge is that it is a one-woman play. British-born actress Vanessa McCaffrey, who has been living in Key West (via Kenya) for many years, brings this wonderful character to life with a puckish sense of fun and naughtiness. Much of her talent is in charming her audiences, who reward her delivery with well-deserved guffaws of appreciative laughter.

A desperate housewife Shirley may be, but she is never dreary or dispirited. In her kitchen getting her husband’s dinner, she is a loveable lady who sees life passing her by, robbing her of youth and good looks. Stuck in the humdrum routine of working, doing laundry, and cooking for Joe, her detached husband, she longs for a little excitement, a transformational fling to an exotic venue. All this she confides to ‘the wall’ (as in, talking to the wall because her husband shuts her out).

It always astonishes me how a single actor, like McCaffrey, can captivate us by reciting lines for about 90 minutes. Just remembering them is remarkable!

McCaffrey rises to this challenge with endearing gusto, bringing all the other characters to life with descriptive wit. In the first act, she manages to create images of the people we will only meet through what she tells us in her kitchen as she sips wine, fantasizing about orgasms and other titillating subjects.

We come to know Shirley well. We know her thwarted youthful dreams, her views on sex, the joyful early years of her marriage, the stale state of it now, and how she’d like to break away from the rut she’s in.

Through her, Joe and her two grown kids, who take her for granted, come to life, as does her nosey neighbor. Then there is her best friend Jane, who offers to take Shirley away from it all for a jaunt to Greece. In the second act, Shirley satisfies her yearning for excitement. She goes to Greece with Jane without telling Joe beforehand, and has a satisfying fling with Costos, a Greek waiter in a taverna on the Mediterranean. What happens next? You’ll have to see the play to find out!

Ably directed by Carole McCartee, Shirley Valentine is happening at

the parish hall of St. Paul’s Church, 401 Duval St. from May 17-20 and 24-27. Seating is limited, so be sure to book now. Tickets available on line at fringetheater.org or by calling 305 731-0581

(Joanna Brady is a Key West writer, author of The Woman at the Light, published by St. Martin’s Press)

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