Looking at the season for this year of the Theatre Guild of Webster Groves, the Guild seems to be fond of the Broadway theatre of the 1950s. It was a period of great American theatre – Arthur Miller. Tennessee Williams, and other serious writers. But it was also a period when many audiences wanted to shrug off the traumas of the war years and enjoy the post-war prosperity with comedies and thrillers. With one exception, that’s the vein that the Guild is mining. And I’m wondering if the audience that might enjoy nostalgic trips to these years is still much with us, present company excepted.

They’ve started this year with The Tender Trap. It did well enough on Broadway to be optioned for a movie starring Frank Sinatra, who also recorded a hit song with the same title.

Protagonist Charlie Reader, played with assured buttoned-down style in Webster Groves by Tom Kessinger is a young man who has moved to New York for his career and discovers that New York is overrun with attractive young women who are eager to throw themselves into his arms. He much likes this. When we first meet him, he’s in a tight clinch with Poppy Matson, a lovely young woman with long black hair, well tossed, played by Shabnam Nouraie, a lovely young woman with long black hair, well tossed. She is barely out the door when another lovely young woman, Jessica Collins, played by Sadie Harvey, a lovely young woman, enters the door eager to clean up Charlie’s messes and straighten up his life, and off again after a tight clinch at the door. She is followed by Sylvia Crewes, another lovely young lady played by another lovely young lady, Lauren Keck. She is Charlie’s date for the evening, and there seems to be some serious interest between them. It is also significant to note that she is picking Charlie up at his apartment, he is not picking her up at his.

Who knows how long Charlie’s bachelor paradise would have lasted or how it might have evolved, but playwrights Max Shulman and Robert Paul Smith introduce a visit from his old friend from his hometown, Joe McCall, played as good friend and family man by Zach Murphy. Joe had gone into pharmaceuticals, and he has come up with a sure cure for the common cold. He’s tested it, it works, and he wants Charlie to join in exploiting it. They are sure to make millions.

As Joe, who is married with children, observes the women moving through Charlie’s apartment, he begins to agree with Charlie that having their company’s offices in New York might be a good idea.

Add to the confusion Sal Schwartz, a typical Andrea Busch hard-edged role.

Joe has given his product to another scientist for tests – Warren Frank is the grim scientist – who is accompanied by another attractive young woman, Julie Gillis, played by the attractive Carolyn Bergdolt. And Julie, of course, immediately falls hard for Charlie.

So what is Charlie to do with all these tender traps?

Director Debbie Love and her cast keep the action moving well, and I’m not convinced it was their fault that I heard few laughs when I was there. Warren Frank’s set uses the Guild stage as usual, though I wasn’t clear why Charlie’s bedroom had a curtained entrance and not a door. Barbara Mulligan has done her usual careful work with costumes, Debbie Love with lights, and Jill Lauman with sound.

The Tender Trap represents its time, I suppose, though it was never clear to me if Charlie is sleeping with any of the women – perhaps deliberately unclear – as it probably would have been clear in the ’60s and after.

—Bob Wilcox

Photo by Robert Stevens