Plot? See title: I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti. Vivacious Antoinette LaVecchia finds Giulia Melucci’s recollections of the men she loved and lost (probably for the better) present no barrier to trying again. Still, just as she embarked in the past on romances with four different guys, she’s equating making food with dishing out love.
Gimmick? While Giulia describes each chapter of her love life and what turn out to be its anti-heroes, LaVecchia assembles an antipasta, tosses a salad, dices and slices Bolognese sauce ingredients and prepares (with help from a little machine) fresh pasta. Though these actually come to special, just-off-stage guest diners in the wrong order for a real Italian dinner, who’s going to quibble after and along with generous drinks of vino rosso? Or during an interesting performance?<
Her kitchen’s like ones TV chefs work with, and LaVecchia apes their style along with that of an accomplished monologist. She confidently approximates the voices of her telephoning Mamma and the different guys in her woeful to wit-filled stories of sex (or lack of it) in the city.
Giulia’s clothing (aproned casual dress to, after an intermission, a more formal red dinner outfit) shows her dramatic change, slight as it may be. Director Rob Ruggiero sees to it that she and everything she uses seem to work easily.
The show’s been called a comically twisted kitchen-sink drama in a Shirley Valentine mode. But I think it’s more like Bad Dates described while cooking instead of trying on shoes. Neither is a bad model to entertain with.
