Lack of message, but plenty of charm

You'll find an abundance of charm and lovely flowers on the stage of the Walnut Street Theatre, and that's a good thing, because it takes ample charm to bring off

Enchanted April

, which opened Wednesday night. A heap of flowers helps.

Matthew Barber adapted the play about four British women who rent an Italian villa for a month in 1922 - it's sometimes characterized as a romantic comedy, which is a stretch - from Elizabeth Von Arnim's novel. The theatrical version, which appeared four seasons back on Broadway, is essentially a play written in 1880s style, a comedy of manners with sharp little turns of plot.

When those turns begin coming in rapid succession in Act 2, after the women move into their vacation paradise for a month, the play's at its quickest pace, and funniest.

But it's hard to overlook Enchanted April's weaknesses: an unreal main character who springs from an endless well of sentimental claptrap; the play's dumb search for a message, which comes in an embarrassing opening speech and a hollow closing one; a setup that promises sparks when we find one character in a clearly compromising position, which the script then ends up overlooking; and the way another provokingly stiff character turns quickly into cornmeal mush. There's more, like the rigid elderly woman who changes her condescending tune because she hears a tale of woe.

Well, you can't always have everything. What you can have, though, is a fine cast, which can't mask the problems but can deliver an evening of . . . charm. For many people, that's more than enough, because Enchanted April does manage to create an enticing atmosphere in which the four highly divergent women - two are barely friends before they advertise for two more to share the vacation villa - come together for an April in what's supposed to be heaven.

In Paul Wonsek's sets, it is paradise, indeed. The first act is played against a huge backdrop of a 1922 London Times, where the villa is first advertised as an enticing getaway from a dreary, rain-soaked Britain. Wonsek outdoes himself in Act 2, with a villa of sweeping Italianate stairs, arched entrances, and flowers falling from the walls and decorating the tables - a sort of stage landscaping.

Alicia Roper has the unenviable task of playing the character who starts it all by barging into her women's club and insisting a stranger join her at the villa - she's unreal even for these days, let alone the formal British 1920s. The stranger's played by Maureen Garrett, and together, the actors make a nice pair: two women with juxtaposing temperaments, both out for a change in their lives.

Meghan Heimbecker plays one of the two women who sign up for the vacation, and she's wonderfully made up to seem right out of a Betty Boop movie, or at least a silent-screen melodrama. She has a good time on stage playing against her foil, the fourth woman, a moralistic crow who has some of the best lines - delivered with consummate skill by Wendy Scharfman. Caroline Rossi's put-upon villa servant is a little gem, and the men - played by Dan Olmstead, Ian D. Clark and Ian Merrill Peakes - do nicely with the lesser-thought-out roles they've been given. They, too, come to be charming in the end, but frankly, I'm not sure exactly how Olmstead and Clark, portraying the two husbands, get there.

By Matthew Barber, from the novel by Elizabeth Von Arnim, directed by Malcolm Black, set by Paul Wonsek, costumes by Ellis Tillman, lighting by Jerold R. Forsyth. Presented by Walnut Street Theatre.

The cast: Alicia Roper (Lotty), Maureen Garrett (Rose), Meghan Heimbecker (Caroline), Wendy Scharfman (Mrs. Graves), Caroline Rossi (Costanza), Dan Olmstead (Mellersh), Ian D. Clark (Frederick), Ian Merrill Peakes (Anthony).

Playing at the Walnut Street Theatre, 825 Walnut St., through April 29. Tickets: $$10-$57.50. Information: 215-574-3550 or www.walnutstreettheatre.org.

EndText