DORSET — Dorset Theatre Festival continues its 2024 summer season with an abbreviated two-week run of one of the most warmly received plays in America today, Kim Powers' “Sidekicked,” directed by Jackson Gay. The story is told in a fast-paced 65 minutes with no intermission, logistics well-suited to an August mix of laughs, tears and heads nodding in agreement. “Sidekicked” is a one-act and one-actor mix of comedy and drama that revolves around iconic TV sidekick, Vivian Vance, who played Ethel Mertz in “I Love Lucy” from 1951 to 1958.
The role gave Vance, already an established actor, meteoric fame, even though she was not Lucille Ball’s first choice for the role. After years of playing Ethel Mertz, the housecoat-wearing sidekick to America’s then-favorite sitcom star, Vivian Vance had a lot she needs to get off her chest. In her dressing room on the night of the show’s final filming, Vance (Kelly McAndrew) issues an SOS to her long-time analyst: help me understand who I really am before I’m stuck being Ethel forever.
And she relives it all: the good, the bad, and, well, the Lucy. A moving passage from Powers’ script sums it all up, and was delivered with expert timing and expression by the deeply talented McAndrew: “I’m not Ethel and I’m sick and tired of playing her. So there.
But who am I without her? I’m not a wife anymore. I’m not a mother. I’m not a .
.. am I even much of an actress anymore? I’m tired of being second banana.
I wanna.