It has been awhile since I’ve seen a play at one of the two major Vancouver theatre companies: The Vancouver Playhouse and the Arts Club.

When I saw that the latter was going to put on Tracy Letts’ Tony Award winning and Pulitzer prize winning August: Osage County, I knew that I wanted to see it.

I thought it was an interesting play to see because I saw a brief clip of it during the Tony Awards a few years ago and Entertainment Weekly named it the best play of the decade (2000-2009).

In case people want to see the play, you have until February 27, 2011 to do so. Here is also the basic premise of the show courtesy of the Arts Club.

For the Westons, one hot summer weekend changes everything forever. This is the funny and poignant account of a dysfunctional family in the midst of a spectacularly entertaining meltdown.

One of the attractions of the play for me was the cast. A lot of familiar faces from Bard on the Beach are in it such as John Murphy as Little Charlie, Andrew Wheeler as Bill Fordham and Gerry MacKay as Sheriff Deion Gilbeau. And to me the main attraction was seeing Wendy Noel on the Vancouver stage again. I read that she hasn’t been seen on the Vancouver stage since 2006 and that is a shame because she was fantastic as Ivy, the middle Weston daughter. I have loved Wendy Noel since I saw her as Catherine Sloper in a mid to late 90s production of The Heiress, my favourite play of all-time.

Letts’ play is filled with sharp, bitingly funny dialogue and in the hands of Nora McLellan as the family matriarch, Violet Weston, she hits it out of the park.  Equal to the task is Karin Konoval as oldest daughter Barbara.

The only weak spot of the play is Anais West as Jean, Barbara’s daughter and Quelemia Sparrow as Johnna Monevata, a Native American hired to be cook and caregiver for Violet. West seemed to try too hard in the first act and you could just tell she was acting but she did get better in the second act and was starting to feel more natural. The same can be said for Sparrow but she was slightly better than West.

Sean Allan as patriarch Beverly Weston is great in his very short stage time. The rest of the cast like Susinn McFarlen and Brian Linds as Violet’s sister and brother-in-law respectively also bring in some nice comic relief.

August: Osage County does a great job of balancing comedic moments with some truly heartbreaking and emotional scenes.