‘Waitress’: Broadway musical centers on a loving community around Joe’s Pie Diner

Dominique Kent, Desi Oakley and Rianny Vasquez star in the LA MIRADA THEATRE FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS & McCOY RIGBY ENTERTAINMENT production of “WAITRESS,” directed by Abbey O’Brien and now playing at La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts. | Jason Niedle/ TETHOS

LA MIRADA, Calif. — Waitress will amuse, delight and inspire, entertain, and teach. It had a four-year run on Broadway, then traveled to London’s West End. It’s now on stage in suburban Los Angeles, enjoying its “Southern California regional theater premiere” (obliquely referring to its Pantages Theatre production in Hollywood back in 2018). Highly watchable, with fast-moving stagecraft and a titillating, down-to-earth heartwarming story about a bunch of small-town working-class folks, it’s a catch if you get the chance. It carries a strong feminist message of self-empowerment, independence and tenacity.

Waitress is the first show of season for La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts & McCoy Rigby Entertainment. It’s based on the 2007 motion picture of the same name written by Adrienne Shelly and sports a sometimes raunchy book by Jessie Nelson with music and lyrics by Sara Bareilles. The current production, running through Oct. 13, stars Desi Oakley reprising her favorite role and Ben Jacoby, who premiered his role in the first regional production, in the lead roles of Jenna and her ob-gyn Dr. Jim Pomatter. Musical direction of a house band situated toward the rear of the café set is by Jennifer Lin. Choreography is by the New York-based duo of Austin and Marideth Telenko known as Cost n’ Mayor, and the director is Abbey O’Brien. An audience member quickly absorbs the estrogen of an almost all-female creative crew.

The score is fresh and tasty, and delivered with gusto, complete with the solo star turns, ensembles, choruses, and dance numbers that make a great Broadway show.

The story focuses on Jenna (Desi Oakley), in an unhappy early marriage to the demanding, self-absorbed Earl (Brian Krinsky). Hardworking waitress at Joe’s Pie Diner, the pie-making whiz Jenna is obliged to hand over her weekly earnings to Earl, who has a drinking problem among his other character flaws. He is outraged one day when he discovers that Jenna has been stashing money around the house, and she explains that it’s for the baby they’re expecting. Earl demands that when the baby comes, she will love him more than the kid. The prospects for success in this marriage are dim.

It’s the community of employees at Joe’s who make up the core of the cast, and who will eventually come together as a “village” to raise little Lulu when she arrives. Cal (Brian Calì) is the head chef and boss, who poses as a strict taskmaster charting the workers’ late arrivals, but is truly a softie at heart. He’s especially hard on Becky (Dominque Kent), a busty African-American woman who is often late to work. The truth is—and this is really one of the main points of the musical—that behind the outer face of what we see in people, we barely know what troubles they might be having at home. In Cal’s case it’s a wife who has denied him intimacy for 15 years, and in Becky’s it’s a severely incapacitated husband she must take care of.

Dawn (Rianny Vasquez) is a shy, nervous waitress who’s never had a boyfriend. Becky and Jenna help her write her website profile. And the only guy who responds to it is the nebbishy nerd Ogie (Jared Gertner), who immediately falls in love with her. Turns out they are both into American Revolutionary War reenactments, she as Betsy Ross and he as Paul Revere, so this is a perfect match!

The action takes place in an unnamed small town. My companion was thinking Texas, maybe. No matter. What impressed me most about the show is the non-judgmental attitude the characters take toward human relationships, even ones outside of marriage. Pregnancy is greeted not with overwhelming joy but with trepidation and doubt. At a pivotal point in the show the stage is filled with three (count ’em) couples in flagrante delicto! Perhaps it reflects a broader empathic consensus among the population at large than the rigid, accusing, punitive politics around personal choice issues that we hear from grandstanding candidates and officeholders—and from the courts.

If Earl is a no-good punk, Waitress does not hold him up as the male standard. People come in all types and the other male characters are infinitely more approachable, if quirky in their own ways. One such is Joe himself, the café owner and frequent customer (Cleavant Derricks, who is quite the star casting for La Mirada, a multi-award-winning stage and film actor). He’a another guy who’s gruff and curmudgeonly toward the world, but actually has a heart of gold—which Jenna already knows because he’s the best tipper in town.

Jenna’s gift of imaginative pie creations, that she acquired at her gramma’s knee, leads her to consider competing in a nearby baking contest with a $20K prize. Between that and a (more than) flirtation with her doctor, she is ready for growth and a change for the better in life—the “pursuit of happiness” promised by the Revolution.

Other performers in the show include Ashley Moniz, Michael James, Ashley Támar Davis, Johnisa Breault, Annabelle Bergold, Layni Rose Cowden, Ricky Bulda, Michael Bullard, Grant Hodges, and Tayler Mettra, Emma Nossal and Alec Talbott. This is an almost all Equity show.

The design team includes: Lighting design by Brian Gale; sound design by Josh Bessom; costume design by Suttirat Larlarb and coordination by Adam Ramirez; hair/wig design by Kaitlin Yagen; make-up design by Madison Medrano; properties supervision by Kevin Williams. The casting director is Julia Flores, and the production stage manager is Jill Gold. The original set design was by Scott Pask.

Before the show began, a team of two of the producers came out to welcome the audience to the new season, and explained something I had not known before. Whether this is typical of other regional theatres, I don’t know, but it’s very interesting. The La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts is owned by the City of La Mirada in southeast Los Angeles County with a 2022 population of some 46,000. The theatre complex is large, imposing, clean, modern and highly professional. The theatre looked full on opening night (Sept. 21). They told the audience that the profits from the theatre’s productions go back to the city budget to fund its programs. I almost jumped in my seat in wonderment, under the impression that so little in theatre (at least most of the theatre I go to) really makes any money, until it dawned on me that if it weren’t for the private ownership of theatres, which make money not only from their own productions but also from rentals, there actually might be a little left over for the public good, even after paying union wages! (Of course, theatre and the other arts are themselves “the public good.”)

Waitress runs through Sun., Oct. 13, with performances Thurs. at 7:30 pm, Fri. at 8 pm, Sat. at 2 and 8 pm, and Sun. at 1:30 and 6:30 pm. There will be an Open-Captioned performance on Sat., Oct. 5 at 2:00 pm. A talkback with the cast and creative team will take place on Thurs., Oct. 10 at 7:30 pm. La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts is located at 14900 La Mirada Blvd. in La Mirada, near the intersection of Rosecrans Ave. where the 91 and 5 freeways meet. Parking is free. Tickets can be purchased at the theatre’s website or by calling the theatre box office at (562) 944-9801 or (714) 994-6310. Children under 3 will not be admitted into the theatre.

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CONTRIBUTOR

Eric A. Gordon

Eric A. Gordon, People’s World Cultural Editor, wrote a biography of radical American composer Marc Blitzstein and co-authored composer Earl Robinson’s autobiography. He has received numerous awards for his People's World writing from the International Labor Communications Association. He has translated all nine books of fiction by Manuel Tiago (pseudonym for Álvaro Cunhal) from Portuguese, available from International Publishers NY.