STAGE REVIEWS : ‘Bargains’ Could Have Been a Better Deal

SAN DIEGO â€”  Plays like “Bargainsâ€� are a dime a dozen.

Jack Heifner’s new comedy at the Old Globe didn’t have to be that way. Focusing on two women who lose their jobs at a department store, “Bargains� initially looks as if it’ll be one of the first plays to peer into the current wave of layoffs.

In the first act, we glimpse the unfortunate result of a corporate takeover of a struggling department store in a small Texas city’s depressed downtown.

Sally (Linda Hart), the one saleslady who remembers the store’s past with pride, tangles with the new manager (Stephen Caffrey). But he’s got his own problems--he’s afraid to answer the phone, fearful that it might be the home office with bad news.

After intermission, however, the play evolves into something else entirely--and that something is extremely familiar. It’s female bonding, country style. It’s a paean to self-assertion, especially regarding dependent relatives.

Losing one’s job is finally seen as a move in the right direction, because it offers a golden opportunity to start anew. You can imagine a group of recently laid-off workers seeing “Bargains� as part of their positive-thinking therapy (assuming they could afford the tickets).

In its attempt to win friends by warming hearts, the play loses its edge.

At first, Heifner establishes a degree of friction between Sally, who seems to be the central character, and her co-worker Mildred (Marcia Rodd). But then the loss of their jobs draws them together. In the second act, these two are bosom buddies.

The play shifts its setting and its attention during intermission, so that Mildred is now the central character. We’re at the trailer she shares with her younger brother Lothar (Gregory Grove), but he has locked her out. A would-be hairdresser, he’s offended that his sister finally let someone else do her hair. Out of this spat comes the play’s remaining conflict.

Lothar is a character who doesn’t even appear in the first act. And the store manager, Sally’s main antagonist in Act I, doesn’t reappear in the second act. It’s as if Heifner wrote two one-acts and couldn’t decide which to extend into a full-length play. So he combined them. Sort of.

He should have concentrated on the workplace issues he raises in Act I. They haven’t been dramatized as often, and their resolution is much less predictable. As it is, there isn’t much doubt that everyone in Act II will come to terms with everyone else.

Meanwhile, we keep wondering about the characters who were cast aside during intermission--not only the store manager but also another co-worker, teen-ager Tish (Kellie Overbey). Her plight is more dire than anyone else’s; she’s about to give birth, and her unseen husband is a wastrel with a wandering eye. Yet she’s dispatched back to the farm and barely mentioned again. Case closed.

Heifner may not know what his play is really about, but he has created a strong showcase for the actors who play Sally and Mildred.

Sally wears nice dresses to work and makes sure there’s always a spare cash register tape handy so the customers won’t have to wait too long while she changes it. Never married, she lives with her invalid mother. But she’s no wimp. She expresses her disdain for the store’s deterioration. And when the manager orders her to go out on the sidewalk and hawk lingerie, she refuses.

Hart has a feline face and a purring voice that are just right for the kind of catty comments Heifner gives her--which also help soften her goody-two-shoes image. It’s a funny performance that transcends some of the role’s inherent cliches (she wanted to be a toe dancer, she had one great love who went off to college, etc.).

Mildred has led a relatively sloppy life, and her bearing and outfits (costumes by Robert Wojewodski) reflect it. Divorced twice, she habitually shows up for work late. She likes to flatter her men. At first Rodd seems almost too commanding for such a frazzled character, but later her countenance goes gooey, along with the play.

The supporting performances are fine, including one by Jeb Brown as Lothar’s rather blank boyfriend. And Ralph Funicello’s sets--the cluttered store in Act I, the trailer park in Act II--look like the real thing.

The script has a few good gags, and quite a few cheap ones. As with the merchandise in the play, Heifner and director Jack O’Brien should conduct a sidewalk sale with some of the jokes. Certainly the ones about the film “ ‘night, Mother� have a limited shelf life.

* “Bargains,� Old Globe Theatre, Simon Edison Centre, Balboa Park. Tuesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7 p.m. Saturday-Sunday matinees, 2 p.m. Ends April 26. $21-$29.50. (619) 239-2255. Running time: 2 hours, 30 minutes.

‘Bargains’

Stephen Caffrey: Mr. Mead

Jeb Brown: Dennis

Linda Hart: Sally

Kellie Overbey: Tish

Marcia Rodd Mildred

Gregory Grove: Lothar

By Jack Heifner. Directed by Jack O’Brien. Sets by Ralph Funicello. Costumes by Robert Wojewodski. Lights by Ashley York Kennedy. Sound by Jeff Ladman. Production stage manager Douglas Pagliotti.