Monday, March 30, 2015

COME MANGIA IN THE KITCHEN WITH GIULIA

MARIA BARATTA AS GIULIA       PHOTO BY PAUL ROTH
 
How hard is it to find the right recipe for romance?  Just ask Giulia Melucci who has tried, unsuccessfully, for years to lure the right man from her culinary delights in her kitchen to the altogether different pleasures of the bedroom.  Her meals are delicious and savory, often culled from her mother's Italian-American cookbook but while they satisfy gastronomically, they fail to seal the deal that culminates in a wedding ring.

The charming and versatile Giulia is being brought to delectable life in the hands and hospitality of Maria Baratta  as she cooks up a fabulous feast right before your eyes in "I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti," a memoir by Giulia that has been cleverly adapted by Jacques Lamarre.  Seven Angels Theater in Waterbury will be cooking up a storm, with fresh pasta created from scratch, complete with antipasto, salad, bread and wine, for a lucky select few, right on stage, until  Sunday, April  26.

Don't come to the show hungry, unless you have a reservation at the nearest Italian restaurant close by right after the curtain falls.  All the action takes place in the kitchen while Giulia chats, easily and hysterically, about the men in her life, as she is preparing a complete meal.  We meet the
gentlemen who one by one broke bread with her and then proceeded to break her heart.  From the young Irish bloke Steve whom she met in college to the smarter and more sophisticated Kit who wrote for the Atlantic Monthly to the older and wiser Marcus, a cartoonist for the New Yorker, with his Vespa scooter and Charles Nelson Reilly voice to Ethan, a musician, writer and TV producer who loved food a lot but not Giulia as much.  She even gave her heart temporarily to a Scotsman who had problems with commitment. 

As Giulia, Baratta voices each of her potential soul mates with astute accuracy and charm, all the while chatting with her mother by telephone, who wants to help and offer advice. Using her culinary delights, her plan is to find true love over lasagna or risotto. For every bad dates she endures and wrong turn she makes, you will root for her to find her one and only.  As she cooks, she tosses a little salt over her shoulder, but, so far, it hasn't brought her luck and rose petals.

Semina De Laurentis directs this delightful show with characteristic sweetness while Daniel Husvar's kitchen set is the perfect setting for all the steamy action.

For tickets ($37.50-52.50), call Seven Angels Theatre, 1 Plank Road, Hamilton Park Pavilion, Waterbury  at 203-757-4676 or online at www.sevenangelstheatre.org.  Performances are Thursday at 2 p.m. and 8p.m., Friday at 8 p.m. and Saturday at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m., with Sunday at 2 p.m.

Twirl a forkful of flavorful and perfectly seasoned pasta as you contemplate the perils and pleasures of the New York City dating scene, where you can starve or feast surrounded by a banquet of male offerings.

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