Mindy Sterling and Arnetia Walker do some late-ish-in-life female bonding on New Year’s Eve in Stan Zimmerman and Christian McLaughlin’s feel-good holiday two-hander Yes, Virginia, the latest from Pop-Up Playhouse.

 Sterling (of Austin Powers fame) stars as Denise Miller, longtime Detroiter with a grown daughter who’d like nothing better that to drag Mom off to Shady Pines, a gay son in L.A. who’s on Grindr when he’s not having work done, and a divorced son from whose death she has still not fully recovered.

Walker (possibly the only actress to have played all three Dreamgirls) shares the stage with Sterling as Virginia, Denise’s once-a-week housekeeper of thirty-seven years, whose unexpected Thursday visit to Mrs. Miller’s Bloomfield Hills, Michigan home has thrown the lady of the house for a loop.

Doesn’t Virginia recall the Olive Garden lunch some months back during which Denise informed the African-American woman that she’d no longer be needing her services?

 It takes a while to figure out which of the two women is either forgetting or imagining things, but once we’ve been filled in on all we need to know about their respective families and the employer-employee history they share, it turns out that it indeed Virginia who’s mind has slipped.

Still, Mrs. Miller can hardly send her longtime housekeeper away without a cup of tea, and certainly not on an icy cold December 31.

 Over the course of Yes, Virginia’s brisk 69 minutes, playwrights Zimmerman and McLaughlin explore the side-effects of aging as Virginia mourns the loss of the car her daughter took away from her, then panics when she thinks she’s lost the purse that’s hanging on a clothes rack just behind her.

Meanwhile, Denise has her own serious health issues to deal with, and both women have children who think they’d be better off in some kind of assisted living.

Along the way, Zimmerman and McLaughlin sprinkle in their trademark one-liners. (“There’s no way those chefs were trained in Rome. Rome, Michigan maybe.”) There’s an absolutely hilarious iPhone encounter between Denise and Siri (“I just want to call my daughter.” “Okay, looking online for Madonna’s phone number.”) and another during which Denise gets Virginia to swear. (“Motherfucker!!”) And just wait till Denise discovers a stash of marijuana lollipops hidden in her closet that turns the still dynamic duo into a couple of “Bad Girls.”

 Under Zimmerman’s able direction, the two veteran actresses display an authentic rapport, with Walker in particular adding plenty of zing to her role.

Scenic designer Stefani Nicole Von Huben has given Denise an appropriately Christmas-decorated living room nicely lit by Miranda Richard, though Virginia’s frequent remarks on the enormity of her employer’s abode would ring truer on a larger stage,

Yes, Virginia is produced by Zimmerman and Von Huben. Andrew Mackin is assistant director. Casting is by Julie Gale. Rolanda Mendelle and Virginia Watson are understudies.

Without trivializing the problems facing Denise and Virginia in their waning years, Stan Zimmerman and Christian Mclaughlin have managed to write an uplifting holiday dramedy. Expect to exit the theater with a smile on your face.

The Dorie Theatre in THE COMPLEX, 6476 Santa Monica Boulevard, Hollywood.

–Steven Stanley
December 16, 2018
Photos: Elvira Barjau

Tags: Christian McLaughlin, Los Angeles Theater Review, Pop Up Playhouse, Stan Zimmerman