Features

By Mary Therese Biebel mbiebel@timesleader.com
Features Writer
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Oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.

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Julian the dentist (Sandy Gabrielson) convinces his nurse, Stephanie (Regina Yeager Todd) and lounge-lizard patient Harvey (Jeff Ginsberg) to pose as his wife and her lover. It’s all part of an elaborate ruse in ‘The Cactus Flower,’ presented by The Actors Circle.

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Toni (Kerry Kearns), at right, doesn’t want to break up the the dentist’s ‘marriage’ to Stephanie (Regina Yeager Todd), who is really his nurse/receptionist.

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If you go

What: ‘Cactus Flower’

Who: Actors Circle

When: Through March 14 with performances at 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sundays

Where: Providence Playhouse, 1259 Providence Road, Scranton

Reservations: 342-9707

Tickets: $12, $10, $8

Julian the womanizing dentist probably never heard that warning from Shakespeare.

“He lies his way through the whole show,” said Billie Joe Herbert, who is directing the farce “The Cactus Flower” for Actors Circle in Scranton.

For a long time, Julian has been telling his girlfriend, Toni, that he’s married. It’s not true, but he considers it a safeguard to prevent her from getting too serious.

As the play unfolds, however, Julian changes his mind. He wants to marry Toni. He tells her he’ll divorce that imaginary wife of his.

“(Toni) wants to make sure she’s not the reason the marriage breaks up. She’s comfortable being the other woman but not comfortable being the home-wrecker,” Herbert said.

So Julian persuades his long-time nurse/receptionist, Stephanie, to pose as his wife.

As a result of meeting Stephanie, Toni believes the “wife” is still in love with her “husband.” She doesn’t want to come between them.

Time for another lie. Julian must now convince Toni the divorce is all Stephanie’s idea, because she has another man in her life. Enter Harvey, a sleazy lounge lizard and dental patient.

“The funniest scene is when everyone is at a nightclub together and Stephanie has to act all romantic with Harvey, even though she’s repulsed by him.

Actor Jeff Ginsberg, as Harvey, is “so believable, you really get creepy feelings when he’s kissing her arm or nuzzling her ear,” Herbert said.

As Stephanie loses her prim-and-proper image – and horn-rimmed glasses – a cactus plant she tends will blossom, too. Hence the name of the comedy.

The show is set in the “swinging ’60s, sandwiched between hippies and disco” and includes music by The Beatles, The Monkees and other groups of that era, and there are enough characters for just about everyone to end up with somebody who is just right for him or her.

“It’s light-hearted,” Herbert said, “like a belated Valentine.”