Texas trilogy chronicles a sorrowful 1900s childhood

Signature Theatre stages Horton Foote's ‘Orphans' Home Cycle'

BY MICHAEL SOMMERS

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

OFF BROADWAY REVIEW

Not to spoil the story, but anyone who attends the first program of three plays in the three-part "The Orphans' Home Cycle" might like to know in advance that life gradually improves for its central figure, Horace Robedaux, as he grows up.

This poor, nice guy suffers such a thoroughly miserable time as a youth during the cycle's opening part that theatergoers might be dissuaded from seeing the remainder of the series presented so beautifully by Signature Theatre Company at its Peter Norton Space.

That would be a mistake because the late Horton Foote's cycle of plays ultimately represents the quiet victory of a good soul over the sad circumstances of his boyhood. Said to be drawn from the life of the playwright's father, "The Orphans' Home Cycle" regards a lonely man who wants to be part of a family.

Set in the early 1900s in and around Houston, Texas, the initial trio of hour-long dramas details Horace's unhappy childhood. Horace is 12 when his dissipated intellectual of a father dies, leaving only debts and embittered feelings between his parents' families. Horace's mother soon remarries but her new spouse only wants Horace's younger sister, Lily Dale, to live with them in the city.

In the second play, two years later, Horace has been sent to work at a bleak plantation where convicts are the main labor force and his miserly employer is a drunken Confederate veteran of Dickensian proportions. The third work happens in 1910 when the 20-year-old Horace visits his mother and Lily Dale only to fall seriously ill and become the unwanted guest of his openly contemptuous stepfather.

Such a bare accounting of Horace's early story unfortunately cannot convey here the subtle detail of Foote's writing, which combines humdrum, roundabout conversation with sharp characterization to summon up very persuasively a bygone era and the individuals who lived in it.

Director Michael Wilson forges an understated and seamless ensemble approach to the dramas in which a few actors only stand out from the others due to the force or eccentricity of their characters. James DeMarse is both funny and frightening as that delusional plantation owner. Jenny Dare Paulin is so self-centered and childish as the teenaged Lily Dale that one practically wants to slap her. The gentle but deep melancholy Bill Heck suggests as the sadder, older Horace makes one fear for his uncertain future.

Hang in there, Horace. Better times are coming. Beginning performances in December, the next three plays regards the young man's courting days and eventual marriage. January sees the final installment that takes Horace and his family into the late 1920s.

"The Orphans' Home Cycle" continues at Peter Norton Space, 555 W. 42nd St., New York. Call (212) 244-7529 or visit www.signaturetheatre.org.