The children of divorced parents all have complicated family stories to tell, but not every child has singer Eddie Fisher for a father, movie star Debbie Reynolds for a mother and a bulbous hairdo as Princess Leia in “Star Wars” as her own enduring pop-cultural identity. Carrie Fisher tells about all that and more in her smart and funny one-woman show “Wishful Drinking” at the Hippodrome Theatre.
Raised amid tabloid newspaper headlines about Eddie Fisher leaving Reynolds for Elizabeth Taylor in one of the all-time great Hollywood scandals, Carrie Fisher has been known to generate a few scandals of her own. Just consider that her never-boring romantic history included a rocky marriage to singer-songwriter Paul Simon. After they divorced, they got along better and went on post-divorce dates for years.
The numerous marriages, divorces, affairs and just plain weird things that Carrie Fisher and her parents went through over a 50-year period provide her with plenty of material for a two-hour show whose basic staging consists of a living room set backed by a screen that’s in constant use for supplementary photographs and movie clips.
Besides telling many embarrassing stories about her family, she also encourages the audience to ask questions and offer their own opinions. Think of it as an opportunity to indulge in celebrity gossip with a casually dressed, 55-year-old actress whose revelations are as open as her feet are bare.
Seemingly everything is fair game in this humorous discussion. Far from being shy about her drug addiction and mental health issues, for instance, she makes crazy jokes about being crazy. The show isn’t called “Wishful Drinking” for nothing.
If anything, Fisher tells so many stories about her family saga that you may feel the need for a scorecard. In the show’s funniest scene, she anticipates that audience response by producing a blackboard covered with photographs of several generations of family members and significant others. Using a pointer, she gives a lesson in what she calls “Hollywood Inbreeding 101.”
There are a lot of other very funny bits in the show, but they deserve to be discovered on your own. “Wishful Drinking” is a great opportunity to watch a celebrity roast herself.
Considering that Fisher has been doing this show since 2006 and even had a Broadway run in 2009, the opening night performance at the Hippodrome was surprisingly bumpy at times. By way of full disclosure, Fisher told the audience that the Baltimore booking marked a return to this touring show after a several month-long hiatus.
She also explained that her recent electroconvulsive shock therapy treatments have affected her memory. Even with the help of a teleprompter conveniently hanging from the Hippodrome balcony rail, Fisher occasionally seemed to lose her train of thought.
But you know what? The show never became a train wreck and the close calls thematically prompted more hilarious stories about life in rehab, finding a friend’s dead body in her bed, trying to get George Lucas to express any emotion on his impassive face and other bizarre incidents that make for a lively evening.
“Wishful Drinking” runs through Feb. 12 at the Hippodrome Theatre, 12 N. Eutaw St., in Baltimore. Remaining performances are Thursday and Friday, Feb. 9 and 10 at 8 p.m., Saturday, Feb. 11 at 2 and 8 p.m., and Sunday, Feb. 12 at 1 and 6:30 p.m. Tickets are $27.25- $57.25. Call 410-547-7328 or go to http://www.Ticketmaster.com.
Article source: http://www.baltimoresun.com/explore/howard/events-entertainment/ph-ho-go-wishful-0209-20120208,0,7236199.story
