EXTRACTS OF REVIEWS FROM LONDON PRODUCTION

 

(King’s Head Theatre, March-April 2004)

 

THREE ON A COUCH

 

BY Carl Djerassi

 

“… keeping an admirable eye on entertainment value, Djerassi betrays a genuine gift for comedy, both in terms of psychobabbly one-liners and situation… Michael Praed shines as the straight-laced analyst, and Leigh Zimmerman oozes sex appeal and brain power as the jilted wife, overseeing the highly suggestive peeling of a mango during a hilarious seduction scene that has juice dripping over the couch. A fruity, fun evening worth taking a pew for.”

Dominic Cavendish, The Daily Telegraph

 

“As the title suggests, Carl Djerassi’s Manhattan comedy is like an animated New Yorker cartoon, where the psychiatrist is as sick as the people he treats… Leigh Zimmerman is a bold, statuesque blonde who can do some wonderfully symbolic things with a mango…. Andy Jordan’s production sustains the delusions to a happy end.”

Robert Hewison, The Sunday Times

 

“For a playwright, novelist and Professor of Chemistry Emeritus, Carl Djerassi knows a lot about mangoes. Fleshy, succulent and eminently edible, these aromatic delicacies play a central role in Djerassi’s screwball comedy about a best-selling but suicidal author, his gorgeous but disaffected wife and an earnest but gullible Manhattan shrink… to Djerassi’s credit he plays all these sober issues for laughs. Djerassi is famous for developing the first synthesis of an oral contraceptive, but as a writer he has a keen ear for an offbeat line. “Normal is not a word we use here,” the shrink says at one point….He is greatly assisted in his funny lines and gags by three very assured actors. The shrink’s office, on a snug stage, has a convincing feel in Nicky Shaw’s design, and director Andy Jordan plays most of the action on and off the couch to great effect. It’s a winning combination… Michael Praed is all tweed, bow tie and stammer as Theodore in a pitch-perfect performance that is a throw-back to 30’s screwball movies. Rolf Saxon, as Stephen, has the open bluster and charm of a Jack Carson, and Leigh Zimmerman, who is a tall drink of water, plays Miriam with the straight-on and sexy confidence of a woman who knows exactly what to do with a mango.”

Ray Bennett, Hollywood Reporter

 

“…an excellent evening… vastly entertained by the play… Djerassi has crafted some fine one-liners, and the play, which pretends to no deep exploration of the human condition, is great fun and splendidly acted. The audience clearly found it, as I did, an evening well spent.”

WhatsOnStage.com, User Review

 

“… you are won over by the amiable performances of Rolf Saxon and Michael Praed as the analyst, while the production enjoys a high voltage asset in the presence of Leigh Zimmerman as Miriam.”

John Gross, The Sunday Telegraph

 

“… a wonderfully provocative and saucy Leigh Zimmerman (Jamie Lee Curtis meets Hitchcock blonde)…”

Georgina Brown, The Mail on Sunday

 

“Three on a Couch has all the ingredients for the perfect play… pacy dialogue; a fun, intelligent set; New York neurosis; a neat plot; love, lust, revenge, ego and a breath-baiting denouement. It’s even written by the chap who invented the Pill…..”

Katrina Manson, Camden New Journal

 

“In Carl Djerassi’s gentle comedy… Leigh Zimmerman’s Miriam is a blonde, leggy vision in tight-fitting outfits (you almost expect her to enter in a Freudian slip)… and in the highlight scene, using a piece of fruit as a means of seduction, proves that it does indeed take two to mango.”

Mark Cook, Evening Standard

 

“… laden with humorous and erotic double entendres…”

Amanda Hodges, London Theatre News

 

“… robust, highly enjoyable performances from Michael Praed as the repressed Freudian, Rolf Saxon as the self-obsessed author and, in particular, Leigh Zimmerman as the glamorous Miriam…”

Robert Shore, Time Out

 

“Carl Djerassi is the American scientist and writer who invented the contraceptive pill. His new play is (a) sexual three-way in New York between a Freudian psychoanalyst, a fame-obsessed writer and the writer’s wife, an edible food artist. Edible is certainly the word for Leigh Zimmerman who plays the blonde, statuesque Miriam as a vamp who would put Veronica Lake in the shade while demonstrating the art of wielding a mango fork (and) towering over Michael Praed’s jittery shrink….if you cherish good performers as exotic beasts of the stage, Zimmerman’s your girl. She has exploded rhythmically across the London stage as Velma in Chicago, the Girl in the Yellow Dress in Contact (partnered by Michael Praed) and will, later this year, be one good reason to go and see The Producers. Here, she wears a series of stunning costumes and proves that a dancer’s graceful posture is no way inimical to the precise delivery of comedy lines….Check that Veronica Lake reference; Grace Kelly’s up there, too. She has made me much more interested in mango’s than was before I sat down. From now on, plain old fruit salad simply won’t do.”

Michael Coveney, The Daily Mail

 

“Carl Djerassi’s thoughtful New York comedy… is entertaining fare. Michael Praed’s… excellent performance is the catalyst for all that is best in this production… Leigh Zimmerman’s sassy, mango-wielding seductress has a vengeful side not to be messed with….Rolf Saxon’s narcissistic, swaggering, best-selling novelist… intent on faking his own death and reading his final reviews in the obituary columns, Saxon’s initially charming author quickly turns obnoxious. This is satisfying, lightweight humour and all three actors maintain the comic pace throughout…”

Dominic Martin, The Stage

 

“The eponymous couch in this playful comedy by Carl Djerassi, inventor of the Pill, belongs to Theodore Hoffman, a Freudian psychoanalyst in New York City… it’s a droll piece, and the cast… do well with their entertaining characters. Rolf Saxon swaggers as the monumentally self-absorbed author, Leigh Zimmerman prowls as the luscious wife and Michael Praed dithers as the shrink who doesn’t seem to know his id from his ego. And it will certainly make you think twice before you embark on a mango.”

Sarah Hemming, The Financial Times

 

"…a light and witty sex romp… Praed and Saxon are a class act as doctor and patient wrestling over professional ethics, while looking like Grace Kelly, Jerry Hall and Tippi Hendren all rolled into one, the magnificent, ultra-leggy and completely gorgeous Leigh Zimmerman is dazzling as the randy blonde wife who drips her mango juice all over Theodore's fork. Nicky Shaw's brown study set is probably the smartest to fill the tiny Kings Head stage for years, while director Andy Jordan gets the best from his starry cast."

Roger Foss, What's On

 

"Carl Djerassi's New York comedy… about an author who stages his own suicide so he can reinvent himself… is worth seeing for its fabulously sexy mango eating scene."

Robert Gore Langton, Daily Express