A suspense-filled script, courtroom sequences that would do Perry Mason proud, and an eye-opening look at what it means to be a United States Marine, A Few Good Men delivers with all of the above in La Mirada Theatre’s gripping, Broadway-caliber revival of Aaron Sorkin’s 1989 edge-of-your-seater.

A stellar Doug Harris plays Navy Lieutenant Daniel Kaffee, a lawyer who’d be first on your list if you wanted to settle out of court, but probably the last you’d want defending you if, God forbid, you were innocent, just one reason why Lt. Cmdr. Joanne Galloway (Leanne Antonio) resents being passed over for Daniel in defending two Guantanamo-based Marines accused of murdering one of their fellow jarheads.

Yes, Pfc. William T. Santiago (Rodrigo Varandas) is indeed dead and buried, but his alleged killers Lance Cpl. Harold W. Dawson (Michael Ocampo) and Pfc. Louden Downey (Brandon Engman) insist Santiago’s demise was the accidental result of a superior officer-ordered hazing, what the Marines at Gitmo call a “code red,” one designed to teach Santiago to never again attempt to coerce a transfer off the island, no matter how hellish life there may be.

It takes a while for Lt. Kaffee to be convinced to actually give the courtroom a whirl, and much of A Few Good Men’s appeal is in seeing the settlement whiz’s coming of age both as a criminal defense lawyer and as a man, but once our hero realizes that Dawson and Downey may indeed have a case (and a legitimate reason not to sacrifice their honor for the brief six months in jail offered by the prosecution if they just put up and shut up), Daniel, his sidekick Lt. J.G. Sam Weinberg (Matthew Bohrer), and Joanne gear up for what is sure to be the fight of their legal lives.

Oscar/Emmy/Golden Globe winner Sorkin cues us in fairly early on to a few of the secrets the defense team will only eventually unearth—most significantly that base commander Lt. Col. Nathan Jessep (Andy Umberger) had, over the strenuous objections of second-in-command Capt. Matthew A. Markinson (Corey Jones), refused Santiago’s request for a transfer (one he now claims to have approved), then instructed Lt. Jonathan James Kendrick (Patrick Stafford) to order Dawson and Downey to code-red Santiago, all the while making it appear to the rest of the squadron that exactly the opposite was being ordered.

If all this sounds more than a tad confusing, rest assured that it’s not, thanks both to Sorkin’s meticulously constructed script and Casey Stangl’s razor-sharp direction of a couldn’t be better cast on John Iacovelli’s ingeniously designed military base/courtroom set.

It took Stangl and casting director Julia Flores a nationwide search to find precisely the right actor to play Kaffee, but bringing Harris out west more than justifies their efforts, the instantly likable New York-based stage actor having us in the palm of his hand even before Kaffee begins his transformation from snarky pragmatist to impassioned warrior.

Supporting performances are uniformly impressive.

Antonio’s plucky Joanne gives back every bit as good as she gets and Bohrer’s acerbic Sam is the ideal counterpart to Harris’s earnest Daniel.

Ocampo and Engman are stunningly convincing as a pair US Marines, neither of whom can fathom why they are being prosecuted/persecuted for simply doing what they were ordered to do.

The always superb Stafford vanishes into Kendrick’s hard-edged Christian Soldier persona, Watanabe is dynamic as both a Washington DC-based captain and as a Marine MD not unwilling to lie if it means a promotion, and Jones does powerful work as an officer who knows too much.

Sara King and Karole Foreman prove themselves as adept at dramatic acting as they are at musical comedy in roles originally written for men, King as deadly serious prosecuting attorney Lt. Jack Ross and Foreman as no-nonsense judge Capt. Julia Alexander Randolph.

Varandas delivers a brief, heartrending cameo as Santiago, with Gabriel Bonilla (Cpl. Hammaker), Isaac J. Cruz (Cpl. Dunn), Aaron Pae Klein (Cpl. Jeffrey Owen Howard), and James Ripple (Tom, MP, Sentry) providing invaluable support, and Bonilla, Cruz, Kodi Jackman, and Varandas doubling as MPs, sentries, lawyers, and more.

Last but not least, Umberger is absolutely riveting as a Marine commander so utterly convinced in the righteousness of his mission that a little coercion here, a little lying there matters not a whit, and his final courtroom confrontation with Harris’s Kaffee is a doozy.

Costume designer Shon LeBlanc’s military uniforms appear convincingly real to these unstudied eyes, with Karyn D. Lawrence’s lighting and Cricket S. Myers’ sound design upping the drama and suspense every step of the way.

Add to this Kaitlin Yagen and Madison Medrano’s wig, hair, and makeup designs and Kevin William’s military/courtroom properties and you’ve got a production design as authentic as designs get.

Bonilla, Noah Collins, Cruz, Jackman, Jones, Klein, Watanabe, and Dylan Wittrock are understudies. Cruz is fight captain and military cadence coach.

Kevin Pollak is fight choreographer. Michael J. Riha is assistant scenic designer, Cidney Eavey is assistant costume designer, and Nita Mendoza is assistant lighting designer.

John W. Calder, III is production stage manager and Lisa Palmire is assistant stage manager. Kevin Clowes is technical director. David Elzer is publicist.

With a cast of characters as plentiful as those that populate A Few Good Men, it’s perhaps no wonder few professional companies can attempt to stage it, let alone do it full justice.

Musical theater may be McCoy Rigby Entertainment’s bread and butter, but when they take a chance on a straight play, particularly one as stunningly staged and performed as A Few Good men, standing ovations are in order.

La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts, 14900 La Mirada Boulevard, La Mirada.
www.lamiradatheatre.com

–Steven Stanley
October 29, 2022
Photos: Jason Niedle

Tags: Aaron Sorkin, La Mirada Theatre, Los Angeles Theater Review, McCoy Rigby Entertainment