‘BIRDS’ BRINGS LOOMING MENACE

There was plenty of suspense, but it was more internal than external, and happened indoors, in a stage version of “The Birds.”

Based more on the Daphne du Maurier story than the 1963 Hitchcock movie, it was staged Friday at Carpenter Square Theatre, 800 W Main in Oklahoma City.

A four-member CST cast performed the piece by Irish writer Conor McPherson, set at “an isolated house … near the water,” in America’s near future.

Finding themselves thrown together in the shuttered house, after birds have turned on man — the play’s “given” — were an odd couple, of sorts, Diane and Nat.

Angie Duke was outstanding as Diane, a cultivated writer-impromptu narrator, who appears to be the glue holding the makeshift family, soon joined by a third, together.

In one memorable monologue, Diane asked the audience if you “returned to it over and over” after you kill someone — a question that seemed academic, until it wasn’t.

Dealing with his own demons, such as his ex-wife having him institutionalized for drinking and other flaws, Doug Monson played Nat as more an average guy, thankful just to be alive, so far.

But Nat, who sleeps long periods, plagued by dreams, also had some low-key yet poetic moments, like when he pointed out that “people around here used to worship the moon.”

Coming between Diane and Nat was Miranda LoPresti, who was brilliant as Julia, a younger woman, often wearing bright red, who arrives bearing suspicious gifts and survival tales.

Soon beginning an affair with Nat, and possibly pregnant, LoPresti as Julia at times seemed the epitome of evil, menacing Diane while she’s reading with an ax before relenting, in a vivid scene.

Upping the suspense ante, too, was a strong, ambivalent cameo by Albert Bostick, an armed but possibly benevolent neighbor, offering Diane a dubious romantic alliance in the play’s sexiest scene.

Subtle, if a little downbeat, the play built up the threat of the birds indirectly with tales of their attacks and sound effects, but made it palpable when they beat against the house’s barred windows and door.

Briskly directed by Mark Fairchild, who designed the fine, serviceable set, the play did a good job of keeping us fearful and in the dark, with its characters, and is highly recommended. — John Brandenburg, for The Oklahoman

[PHOTO PROVIDED] One day when Diane is left alone, a mysterious neighbor surprises her with a food offering. The scene is from “The Birds,” a thriller in which four people try to stave off attacking birds when nature seems to turn against mankind. Pictured are Albert...