The three singing Chalk sisters have seen valleys, but through the years and through the tears, the music has lifted them up.
Judeen once had a scandalous S&M affair with a minister of music. Judelle is a recovering alcoholic who has stumbled mightily as she carried the cross of addiction. And though pretty little Belva has been unlucky in love, she nearly got swept away by a close encounter of the alien kind.
Now, after nearly torching an Atlanta bar, they’ve been sentenced to a honky tonk for the holidays. A judge has ordered them to put on a community-service fund-raiser that’s causing them to miss their beloved Santa Bus Train Caravan to Nashville.
That’s the thin and silly premise of “Holidays with the Chalks,” an Alliance Theatre world premiere that turns the downstairs Hertz Stage into a country juke joint where patrons can sip adult beverages and listen to the twangy, glass-half-empty tales of these luckless cowgirl troupers.
As written and performed by Mary Brienza (Judeen), Kathryn Markey (Judelle) and Leenya Rideout (Belva), “Holidays with the Chalks” is a gleeful diversion from some of the well-trod entertainments that turn Atlanta into tinsel town every season.
Directed by Susan V. Booth, this trio of performers brings considerable talent, charm and comedic spark to their material. In their boots and rhinestone outfits (by Carol Hammond), these gals make hootenanny music with washboards, oatmeal boxes, cans and quarters. And they tell marvelous vignettes about their various misdemeanors, marriages and misfortunes via clever, well-crafted lyrics (“Hog Wild and & Hog Tied,” “Space Cowgirl,” “Mud Flap Mama” and so on).
But while the show might work just fine as a stand-alone musical revue, it comes to a screeching halt in the story-telling department. It’s missing any semblance of a book and its flimsy narrative string hardly makes for a cohesive ball of yarn. So much of this cornball patter feels like an afterthought that even the performers don’t seem to buy into the truth of their characters’ half-baked nonsense.
While audience-participation gags usually make me recoil in horror (and fear of getting picked), “Holidays with the Chalks” actually seems to find its groove during a contest in which viewers are plucked from their chairs to do ridiculous things with boots. And funnily enough for an entertainment that purports to be about the most wonderful time of the year, the piece ends with a patriotic number more appropriate to the 4th of July.
Apparently, the Chalks were born nearly two decades ago when these three actors were doing sketch comedy. To be sure, “Holidays With the Chalks” seems to play better when it goes off script and into the realm of improv. Set designer Kat Conley has turned the Alliance’s intimate black box into a delightful little watering hole that almost insists that we have a drink. If the show doesn’t make you smile, I might chalk it up to the lack of tippling. The Chalks sure pour their giddy hearts and souls into making us merry.
Theater review
“Holidays With the Chalks”
Grade: C+
7:30 p.m. Tuesdays-Thursdays. 8 p.m. Fridays-Saturdays. 2:30 p.m. Saturdays-Sundays. 7:30 p.m. Sundays. Through Dec. 23. $20-$39. Alliance Theatre, Hertz Stage, 1280 Peachtree St. N.E. 404-733-5000, alliancetheatre.org
Bottom line: A corn-ball Christmas.
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