HOW HIGH THE MOON


If you think the 1950s were all The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet and Leave It To Beaver, then you haven’t met the the Butlers and Thompsons of Van Nuys, whose hornet’s nest of secrets and lies come to light over the course of an explosively entertaining Fourth Of July weekend in Barbara Nell Beery’s How High The Moon.

It’s Independence Day 1952, the war has been over for seven years now (though there’s a new one raging in Korea), and things have pretty much gotten back to normal for Walter Butler (David Nathan Schwartz), his wife Millie (Kathy Barnes), their next-door neighbor Violet Thompson (Jennifer Ashe), and married-to-each-other offspring Russell Butler (Matthew Gademske) and Amy Thompson Butler (Caroline Quigley).

Or things would be normal if Amy hadn’t just moved over from his parents’ place and back to her widowed Mom’s, if blood-phobic USC School Of Dentistry grad Russell weren’t freaking out about his first wisdom tooth extraction on Monday, and if his dentist dad would only listen to his son’s ideas about putting their land to good use and build a few homes on it.

No, things aren’t exactly going swimmingly for these San Fernando Valleyans on this smoggy Fourth Of July, and they’re about to go from bad to worse when Russell’s war-vet older brother Harris (Lane Compton) pulls up on his motorcycle followed almost immediately by  Amy’s copywriter older sister Allison (Anya Profumo) down from San Francisco and then by Walter’s nouveau riche younger brother Carl (John Posey) who’s driven over from Beverly Hills.

If all this sounds like a lot for a playwright to take on in a play that takes place over the course of twenty-four hours (and goes by in a lickety-split intermissionless 90 minutes), it is, and if I were being a curmudgeon about it, I’d probably say that all of this happening in so brief a time span is a tad hard to swallow, but one of the things I like best about Beery’s play is there’s not a dull or wasted moment in it.

It’s also a fascinating look back at the pre-Eisenhower 1950s, back before the San Fernando Valley’s once ubiquitous orange groves got bulldozed to smithereens to make way for single-family ranch homes extending all the way from North Hollywood to Reseda, back when working girls like Allison were the exception to the rule that a woman’s place was in the home, back when and no son worth his salt would dream of betraying his father’s dreams that he join the family business, and back when anyone refusing to sign a loyalty oath before accepting a teaching position at a state university might likely be branded a communist or worse.

Veteran sitcom director Asaad Kelada keeps an entire TV season’s worth of drama packed into a breakneck-paced 90-minutes (think Arthur Miller on steroids) while eliciting one topnotch performance after another from an all-around terrific cast.

Compton is charismatic and dynamic as all get-out as a young man who’s been through WWII hell and come back stronger for it while Quigley’s lovely Amy epitomizes the era’s dutiful wife even if marital woes have made her less than enthusiastic about performing her wifely duties, and handsome newcomer Gademske shines as her increasingly restless husband.

Schwartz’s opinionated Walter may be convinced that Father Knows Best, but the dentist is no Robert Young, something Barnes’ dutifully devoted 1950s wife knows only two well, and Ashe matches the two stage vets as a widow with at least one skeleton hidden in the family closet.

Profumo’s acerbic Allison provides a breath of fresh air amidst the stifling San Fernando Valley smog and Posey’s galloping go-getter of a Carl is everything his risk-averse older brother is not.

Last but not least, How High The Moon looks absolutely fabulous thanks to scenic designer Thomas Meleck’s detailed side-by-side family homes, Cameron Massey’s vivid lighting, and Michael Mullen’s pitch-perfect period costumes, with Max Gorbachev providing an effective sound design of 1950s tunes and script-inspired effects along the way.

How High The Moon is produced by Bonnie Kalisher Dukes. Alexandria Sanders is assistant director. Sarah Acuña is stage manager. Garry Kluger is light and sound coordinator. Philip Sokokoff is publicist.

Whether you lived through the 1950s and crave a bit of theatrical nostalgia or you didn’t see the light of day until after Y2K, I expect you’ll find much to enjoy in Barbara Nell Beery’s affectionate (though hardly rose-colored) look back at a transformational decade in American life.

Theatre West, 3333 Cahuenga Blvd. West, Los Angeles. Through August 16. Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00. Sundays at 3:00.
www.theatrewest.org

–Steven Stanley
August 1, 2026
Photos: Garry M. Kluger

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