By Scott Clark
She Loves Me, Community Players, December 8, 2023
She Loves Me is a charming and heartfelt musical, which far too few theater-goers are familiar with in the modern age…and that’s a shame. It has an unusual and complex background. Premiering on Broadway in 1963, it featured a book by Joe Masteroff (Cabaret, 70 Girls), with music by Jerry Bock and lyrics by Sheldon Harnick (the latter two perhaps best known for Fiddler on the Roof). It has had multiple “revivals” on both the Broadway and London stages in the years since. It was actually the third adaptation of a 1937 non-musical play, Parfumerie by Hungarian playwright Miklos Laszlo. She Loves Me came after the non-musical 1940 film adaptation, The Shop Around the Corner (with Margaret Sullivan, Jimmy Stewart and Frank Morgan), and the 1949 film musical In the Good Old Summertime (with Judy Garland, Van Johnson and Buster Keaton). The same source material was later adapted into the 1998 film You’ve Got Mail (starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan).
Set in a successful perfume shop (a.k.a. parfumerie) in Budapest in the 1930s, the action revolves primarily around the combative work-and-personal relationship between the store’s longtime assistant manager, Georg Nowack (portrayed by Matt Osmotherly) and Amalia Balash (played by Zoe Tien), a young woman who earns herself a position as one of the store’s exclusive sales clerks. Additional key characters (and their performers) include fellow sales clerks Ladislav Sipos (Marshall Tuttle), a friendly and cautious family man who provides Georg with advice, and Steven Kodaly (M.C. Sothan), the womanizing “charmer” in the perfumerie, who’s having an affair with store cashier Ilona Ritter (Natalie Frahm). Arpad Laszlo (Noelle McVicar) is the shop’s young bicycle-riding delivery boy, with hopes of becoming one of the clerks. And Mr. Maraczek (Skip Philson) is the older owner of Maraczek’s Parfumerie. The cast is rounded out by Elizabeth Philson, Marikita Saure, Elena Rinne and Ashley Hothan, who each take on several recurring supporting roles, including store customers, waiters, diners, private investigators, etc.
At its heart, She Loves Me is a romance story between two characters who don’t realize they’re in love with each other, and, in fact, still have trouble believing it even when they tumble to the truth. Georg and Amalia have been exchanging anonymous “lonely hearts” pen-pal letters with each other for weeks, even before Amalia is hired in the parfumerie. Each has fallen hopelessly in love with the unknown person they have been exchanging letters with – “Dear Friend” – unaware they’ve been working side by side with each other – a situation which comes to a head when they each separately agree to meet their fellow “Dear Friend” in person, at last. As expected in a “rom com” musical, this comedy of misunderstandings doesn’t exactly go as planned. Subplots involving Mr. Maraczek discovering his wife has been unfaithful, Arpad proving to be indispensable, and Ilona dropping the somewhat sleazy Kodaly in favor of a new love, whom she met at the library, provide opportunities for all the cast members to share the spotlight for their own highlighted “moments”.
Zoe Tien and Matt Osmotherly serve as excellent anchors in a strong cast, with each of them excelling at both solo numbers and duets. Amalia’s “Will He Like Me?” in Act I and “Vanilla Ice Cream” near the start of Act II are both beautiful, emotional moments, and give Tien some powerful opportunities to connect with the audience. “Vanilla Ice Cream” was probably my favorite moment in the show! Georg’s comically hopeful “Tonight at Eight” in Act I and the titular “She Loves Me” in Act II give Osmotherly some equally strong moments as well. These two actors have terrific mutual chemistry, whether they’re verbally sparring or warming up to each other in the second act. Each of the rest of the main cast have key songs as well – Arpad’s “Try Me”, as he works to convince Maraczek to let him be a sales clerk, is full of energy and hope (and my wife said McVicar really “sparkled” in this outgoing role). Natalie Frahm provides a lot of comic relief, and really nailed the humorous, fast-paced comedy song “A Trip to the Library”, which had the audience laughing. This one is another of my personal favorites – not surprising, considering my profession. Sothan was particularly “oily” (my wife’s observation again) throughout the show, and does a marvelous job with Kodaly’s final song “Grand Knowing You”. Tuttle brings a lot of both humor and optimism to Sipos’ only solo number, “Perspective”. And Maraczek has a couple of memorable short solos, “Days Gone By”, and “Maraczek’s Memories”, which Philson pulls off with considerable poignancy.
I love having live musicians provide the music for stage productions, as opposed to a recorded soundtrack. The seven musicians providing the orchestration for She Loves Me, while perhaps not always perfectly in tune, were still enthusiastic and energetic, and provided a good background support to the vocalists. Costume selection (by cast member Sothan and Lindsay Armstrong) was excellent – we were seated in the front row and everyone looked gorgeous, especially from just a few feet away. Brandon Clark’s lighting design, especially on spotlights used in key moments, was very effective. There were a lot of moving parts to the set, which looked great, but took a while to move back and forth, making the pace occasionally slow down a tad during scene changes. I really liked the contrast between the parfumerie’s wide-open spaces and the cramped and intimate back office space, and I was fascinated to read the labels on all of the items on the parfumerie’s shelves. Finally, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the very effective choreography throughout the show, and the cast members’ skills at making use of the space provided by this theater’s very large stage. Hours later, I’m still smiling at the madcap song-and-dance antics on display by the members of the supporting cast in the fast-paced “A Romantic Atmosphere”.
All in all, She Loves Me at Community Players Inc. in Beatrice is a very charming and emotionally engaging production, with some top notch singing and terrific chemistry among the entire cast, that shows how much they have enjoyed working with each other, through thick and thin. This is a show that deserves more attention, and if you’re looking for a good holiday gift for yourself (or someone you know who loves humor, romance, old-fashioned letter writing, and happy endings), you can’t go wrong treating one and all to this lovely little gem!
If you go: The Community Players Theatre is located at 412 Ella St.., in Beatrice, NE 68310 – about 40 minutes south of Lincoln. Remaining performance dates for She Loves Me are Saturday and Sunday, December 9th and 10, and Friday, Saturday and Sunday, December 15-17 – Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30 p.m., and Sunday matinees at 2:00 p.m. There is one ten-minute intermission, and concessions are available. Get your tickets now at www.beatricecommunityplayers.com or by calling the box office at (402) 228-1801.
Ticket prices for She Loves Me are $19 for adults and $13 for children and students.
Discounts are available for groups of 10 or more.
Community Players, an award-winning theater located in downtown Beatrice produces a variety of entertainment and educational programs featuring the talents of performers from throughout Southeast Nebraska.
Scott Clark has worked in a variety of roles for the Lincoln City Libraries for nearly 45 years, where he regularly shares book, music and film reviews on their readers advisory website, BookGuide. He’s also reviewed books for the Lincoln Journal Star, and KFOR radio, and has shared his reviews of films and stage shows on his blog and Facebook feeds for many years. He’s a reader, writer, actor, and theatre nerd, who loves to share his enthusiasms, in an effort to connect people with things they just might fall in love with!
As always, if you liked this content and want more, please join our email list and like us on Facebook!