City: Tulsa, OK

Category: Shopping

Telephone: (918) 587-5030

Address: 1381 Riverside Dr.

Description: The Drunkard has been playing at the Spotlight Theatre since 1953, making it the longest running play in America and second longest in the world—second only to London’s The Mousetrap by Agatha Christie, which opened in 1951. What keeps people coming to the theater? The play is hokey by today’s standards. It was actually written in the late 1800s and was taken seriously by the audiences of its day. It was a preachment against the evils of alcohol. This production plays it like an exaggerated melodrama—played for laughs. Little Mary’s father, the drunkard, promises he won’t go back to the bar until she recovers from an injury. Little Mary announces that she is not getting well but is, in fact, dying, thereby assuring that her father will never drink again. A sad scene, it’s played with such broad humor that the audience feels little sadness at Little Mary’s cheerful demise.In between acts, the audience sings along with a superb piano player—belting out old, old favorites that are so long in the tooth that many of the younger members of the audience might be left silent while the seniors sing “Bill Bailey” and “Bicycle Built for Two” with gusto.This is one of the entertainment bargains in Tulsa. And you get two shows for the price of one—the melodrama and the olio—a vaudeville-style variety show. Cast members rotate, as do olio performers. The play is always the same, but the olio differs from week to week.The show is fun, funky, and clean. There’ll be no Tonys awarded for it, but the delight and dedication of the troupe is obvious and contagious.Another reason to go to the theater is to see the building. Designed by Bruce Goff for piano teacher Patti Adams Shriner, it’s one of Tulsa’s art deco classics. The white stucco exterior is accented with narrow vertical windows and black tiles—like piano keys. These shapes are echoed in the glass of the huge round window, center front. Inside are replicas of the original Olinka Hrdy murals that decorated the walls of the piano studio. Shriner and Hrdy went ‘round and ‘round—arguing about the colors in the murals and the execution of the design elements. The murals all had music themes but Shriner was adamant in her disdain and dislike of jazz. She refused to have any references included in the paintings. The murals were nonrepresentational with strong linear elements—abstract but with definite structure. It was Hrdy’s “gotcha” that in the design of one of the paintings, she spelled out the word “jazz,” hidden within the swirling and busy patterns of the picture. The word is almost impossible to detect—until the color is removed as a disguising element. In other words, if the mural is photographed in black-and-white, the “jazz” is revealed.The show plays every Saturday night (unless a major holiday falls on Saturday). The Spotlight is also involved in children’s theater and mounts regular performances throughout the year.