A Spinster at the Center of a Madcap Swirl. Cue the Double Entendres. ‘Drop Dead Perfect,’ a Comedy With Everett Quinton
Anita GatesJuly 22, 2014: In a sweet 1950s peach crocheted dress and matching bolero, Everett Quinton has never looked lovelier. As Idris Seabright, a lonely and overwrought spinster growing old in the Florida Keys, he laments a storm having wreaked “havoc on my African hibiscus — and my poor bougainvillea,” hitting each syllable with that posh Eastern accent that 1930s actresses favored. When a chord of ominous movie music plays, Idris strikes a terrified pose, and we could easily be downtown at the Ridiculous Theatrical Company, where Mr. Quinton and Charles Ludlam starred in the original The Mystery of Irma Vep 30 years ago. Mr. Quinton is a genius. It is absolute rapture to see him in his element in Drop Dead Perfect, a Pecadillo Theater Company production at the Theater at St. Clement’s that originated at Penguin Rep in Rockland County. Drop Dead Perfect has abundant plot. Vivien (Jason Edward Cook), an orphan with artistic talent and a leg brace (“Vivien, you’re a cripple,” Idris snaps), wants to study in New York. The family lawyer, Phineas Fenn (Michael Keyloun), supplies Idris with suspicious pills. A young Cuban, Ricardo (Jason Cruz), pays a visit, setting libidos aflutter. Idris keeps changing her will. And when she’s painting her still lifes, her subjects’ tendency to move annoys her so intensely that she may do something — ominous chord (sound design by William Neal) — horrible.
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