“Josey” Takes You for a Wild Ride
Arlington Sun Gazette June 10, 2004
“Josey” Takes You for a Wild Ride
By Rolly Strauss, Staff Writer
Horizon’s Theater’s “Pumping Josey: Life and Death in Suburbia,” is the story of a modern young woman who moves to the big city to seek her fortune and discover what her dreams might be.
She is aware of no particular talent or ambition for herself, but she thrills at finding in the city “everyone is someone else” – the lawyer’s really an actor, the ophthalmologist’s really an artist. Everyone has a dream.
Josey, an actuary, despairs of ever “finding herself” (as we used to say in the Seventies), yet through marriage and children she still searches. She looks to her family and friends for inspiration and to an odd assortment of heroines from history: Hannah Senesh, Anna Freud, and Mary Todd Lincoln. Her thoughts develop into lively discussions with her heroines and relatives, both sane and certifiable.
Pam Sherman – who co-wrote “Pumping Josey” with Caleen Sinnette Jennings – plays the title role, as well as the nine other characters, all female. Sherman is more than up to the challenge as she adapts to each new role with fine acting, perfect timing and incredible energy, but Sherman is also intimately familiar with the characters and the events.
A critical incident in Sherman’s own life was, in fact, the inspiration for “Pumping Josey.” The sudden death of a good friend, a young suburban mother like herself, becomes the pivotal moment in the play.
Excellent technical effects of projected images and sound are used with restraint to underscore pacing and amplify the action on stage. David Hilder [directs] and Jill Duboff provided the excellent sound design.
Sherman brings “Pumping Josey” fully alive, blending seriousness and huge doses of humor, as the young woman travels to a city of dreams, and back to suburbia, the land of things as they are. Whatever one thinks of the conclusion of “Pumping Josey,” it’s one entertaining and rip-roaring ride along the way.