Two years ago Laguna Playhouse hit the jackpot by presenting a stage version of a 1967 screen classic about sex, The Graduate, starring a famous actress, Melanie Griffith, as Mrs. Robinson. Now the venerable SoCal theater is panning for gold in the same river by presenting another theatrical rendering of a 1967 movie about love, featuring this time not one, but two, marquee names. Paul Rodriguez and Rita Rudner, both known as comedians and actors, co-star in Neil Simon’s Barefoot in the Park, which opened on Broadway in 1963 with Robert Redford, who four years later joined Jane Fonda for Hollywood’s take on the beloved romantic comedy.
However, Rodriguez and Rudner, who are both in their sixties, do not play the show’s leads. The newlyweds are portrayed by Lily Gibson as Corie, while Nick Tag - who co-starred opposite (or should we say underneath?) Melanie’s Mrs. Robinson in Laguna’s Graduate - graduates from Ben Braddock to Paul Bratter in Barefoot. Rudner portrays the young wife’s mother, Ethel Banks, while Rodriguez essays the role Charles Boyer played in the movie, Victor Velasco.
