The Centaur
Theatre capped off its 2014-2015 season with a comedy that’s a triple-tiered
smash.
“Triplex
Nervosa” by Marianne Ackerman, tells a series of interwoven stories in the life
of a triplex apartment complex in the increasingly trendy Mile End district of
Montreal, in the midst of the 2008 financial crisis. Tass Nazor is the landlord
of the triplex in question, and has hired Rakie Ur, a Russian immigrant to be
her new superintendant and enforcer to a hermit-like tenant who is delinquent
with the rent. As if she doesn’t have enough problems, Tass has to deal with
another tenant who plans to leave, but not until he sells his property in
T.M.R. (which delays her plans to have his apartment entirely renovated), a
young Westmount woman who is getting over a bad break-up and considers renting
one of the apartments so she could convert it to an art studio, and a Chassidic
rabbi who formerly owned the triplex, who is a questionable business negotiator
and admits he could have gotten a better deal for Tass if she was a man (or was
married).
When Max
Fishbone (the hermit tenant) dies suddenly, Tass and Rakie worry that the
police will think they played a part in his mysterious death, which could mean
the end of Tass’ triplex ambitions.
This
production works so well mainly because of the strong ensemble of local actors
that make up the cast. It is so well-anchored by Holly Gauthier-Frankel as
Tass, the harried, stressed out landlord, who plays the part with so much comic
nervous energy as she copes with all the compounded aggravation she experiences
that gives her a big triplex headache. Also, special shout outs go to
scene-stealers Karl Graboshas as superintendant/enforcer Rakie Ur, and Cat
Lemieux as Montreal Police Sergeant Tremblay, in which the scene where she
questions Tass and Rakie after Max Fishbone’s death, is a fun piece of comic
repartee which allows room for some well-placed ad-libbing (especially when it
involves a crumbling slice of pizza).
So whether
you lived in a duplex, triplex or apartment building as a landlord, super or
tenant and know all the foibles, pitfalls and aggravations of being one of the
three, “Triplex Nervosa” offers an entertaining – albeit temporary – antidote
to the stressful world of rental properties; it’s playing at the Centaur until
May 17.
