When you hear that Ed Howard's play is based on a novel by the author of "Fried Green Tomatoes," it's only natural to expect a nostalgic warm-hearted comedy featuring familiar regional archetypes and a heroine whose spunky resourcefulness leads to happy-ever-afters. If you can park your between-the-lines red-flag radar behind the sofa—along with any first-hand memories you might harbor of experiences similar to those recounted by our suspiciously unreliable narrator—you won't be disappointed.
Better park your moral compass, too. In this grim spring of 2021, a season that includes a startling TWO productions of Shakespeare's Measure for Measure, a story set in the Deep South—Hattiesburg, Mississippi, to be specific—during the summer of 1958 almost guarantees a toxic social environment within a corrupt universe, where the Good can only be rewarded after employing the same dishonest, underhanded, opportunistic tactics as the Wicked.
This explains how young and underprivileged Daisy Fay Watkins comes to find herself a contender for the title of Miss Mississippi and, more importantly, the scholarship prize that comes with it—her campaign facilitated by a pair of hard-drinking guardians, a friendly fey milliner, and the financial sponsorship of a banker she rescued in a raid on the town gay bar. The first act of this 70-minute solo audioplay, adapted from New American Folk Theatre's 2015 production, acquaints us with the events leading up to the final showdown, while the second is devoted to documenting the glamorous gala in urban cosmopolitan Tupelo.
Whether you were lucky enough to have seen Charlie Irving's performance five years ago in the cozy Redtwist storefront, or are only now being exposed to the kind of Southern candor that issues a polite warning to audiences whenever the language is about to get—um, salty—you will find yourself cheering on Daisy Fay's escape from the fate of small-town girls (whose abuse elicits so little comment that only the most sharp-eared listeners will mark it).
This is no "Mean-Girl" romp, however. Some people have a knack for attracting serendipity, and it's not their fault if best friend Pickle joins her in thrashing school bullies, or two runner-up pageant contestants deliberately sing a jaw-dropping scatological ditty during the talent competition to boost her standing with the judges. Fortune favors the pure in heart, you know.
