Dad vs. daughter: Naples Players 'Charles Ives' studies a loving disconnect

Mark Vanagas learned violin. JamieLynn Bucci learned how to dribble a basketball. Robert Ball learned the life and compositions of 20th-century composer Charles Ives. 

Naples Players Associate Artistic Director Jessica Walck is still learning: She'll find out in the next month whether Naples audiences have an appetite for an edgier story in Blackburn Hall, the larger of the two spaces in Sugden Community Theatre. "Charles Ives, Take Me Home" unfolds the prickly relationship between a divorced dad and his headstrong daughter, complete with some raw language and no intermission in its 75-minute run.

There's love, too, in an undercurrent that whooshes by dad and daughter too often unseen. 

"There's kind of a universal message in this play," Walck said. "Everybody will take something different away from it, but I think everybody's going to find something in it."

She felt the larger stage was a better setting for its musical elements which wrap around the scenes. "I think one of the things about the music it's very vast and very big."

That doesn't mean it's very Charles Ives. In fact, Ives' music is generally confined to John Starr's rehearsal moments. The playwright gave directors quite a bit of latitude musically; expect sound washes of "Thunderstruck," by the Cellos, and "Spectrum of the Sky," by Break of Reality, to usher some of the action. 

Of course, this stage also has a better space for dribbling a basketball.

Laura Starr (Bucci) can think of nothing but the sport, and her violinist father (Vanagas) can think of nothing but the value of music, as modeled in his 20th-century idol, composer Charles Ives. John Starr once had the good fortune to have the composer as his teacher in music school, and the quirky father of American polytonality even pays spiritual visits as the occasional observer and facilitator.

This is no Atticus-Scout Finch familial bond. There are better parallels to the father-son relationship in "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime." When Laura actually reads a book on Ives and throws out that he made his living as an insurance salesman, her father erupts: "That's like the least important detail! He was an AMAZING composer!"

The point that she has tried to understand his fascination is totally missed. Had her father read the book himself, he might have learned that Ives also loved sports: he coached baseball. 

The cast learned quickly they had to be committed. Vanagas took violin positioning lessons from professional Jeff Leigh. Bucci said she had played nearly every sport except basketball in high school and had to start with basics. She watched videos of WMBA games.

"I actually went down into the neighborhood and actually said to some kids 'Can you teach me how to dribble?'" she recalled. "It really helped." 

"I not only have to dribble — I had to learn how to dribble in time (to music) and learn some fancy tricks with the ball."

All three said they saw its elements of love, but handled with the blinders of each one's passion. There are sacrifices: John gives up an impressive orchestra position to stay near his daughter. His daughter picks up her father's habits, including a few swear words that get her locked out of her mother's apartment. 

"It is a story of obsession. The only balanced one really is Charles Ives, who had  a business to get to family to get to music and that's not easy in life, " Ball said.

Vanagas saw Ives' balanced life somewhat akin to being in community theater such as The Naples Players: "We  get to enjoy it because we're passionate about it, and like Charles Ives, we have a day job."

Ball Googled his character's actual life and listened to enough of his music to get pleas from his wife to stop. He saw Ives as a worthy observer of the ongoing drama between Laura and John "I really ended up liking the man."

'Charles Ives, Take Me Home'

Who: Naples Players production of the Jessica Dickey play

When: 7:30 p.m. Wednesdays and Thursdays, 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays through Feb. 11

Where: Blackburn Hall, Sugden Community Theater, 701 Fifth Ave. S, Naples

Tickets: $40, $35, students/ educators $10

To buy: www.naplesplayers.org or call (239) 263-7990

Something else: Strong language