‘Doorstep’ keeps audience guessing

The play had been a staple at the Thibodaux Playhouse for many years, and now director Perry Martin is bringing “The Great Big Doorstep,” the 1940s Broadway comedy about a poor Cajun family’s attempt to get a better home, to his Bayou Playhouse in Lockport in November and December.

Martin said “Doorstep,” penned by New York City writers Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett, received good reviews when it opened on Broadway but flopped because nobody knew what a Cajun was.

The director revived “Doorstep” in 1986 at his Oak Alley Dinner Theater in St. James Parish.

In the play, the Crochet family, who lives in a dilapidated rental shack, finds a doorstep in the Mississippi River belonging to a plantation manor and believes the discovery means a bigger house is in the future.

“The play follows their journey to find a house to match the doorstep,” Martin said. “They go through a whole bunch of hullabaloo to get the house. The whole show is about that.”

Mother Crochet (Jana Cheramie) and husband “Commodore” T.J. Crochet (Rick Duet), a ditch digger who calls himself a drainage expert, have six children. T.J. picked up his nickname from his days on the river.

The couple schemes about ways to get the new house while dodging their landlady.

“It’s part of the rollercoaster ride,” Martin said. “There are many bumps in the road.”

“Doorstep,” set in 1942, is hilarious but deals with racial issues and the clash between Texas oilmen and the Cajuns. “It’s done in a comical way,” Martin said.

“It makes fun first, but there’s honesty,” Cheramie said. “There was a lot of ignorance. Being from Texas was one notch lower than being a dog. The Texans did not have a lot of respect for the Cajuns.”

Cheramie will not have any trouble speaking in a thick Cajun accent for her role as Mrs. Crochet since she grew up speaking French as her first language.

The Galliano resident had the lead in the Bayou Playhouse’s production of “Okra.” She also acted in the theater’s staging of John Doucet’s play about the destruction of Cheniere Caminada, “Tant Que Durera La Terre.” In fact, all the acting Cheramie has done has taken place at the playhouse.

“Perry Martin is brilliant at what he does,” she said. “They make it a lot of fun. I’m loving the script. This has gotten me into plays, seeing plays.”

Duet, an associate professor of mass communication at Nicholls State University, is a professional actor who performed the Commodore Crochet role in 1986 at Oak Alley.

He has a master of fine arts in acting and has performed Off-Broadway, at regional theater in the Northeast and at Shakespeare festivals.

“It’s a thrill, a lot of fun,” said Duet, who called himself 100 percent Cajun. “To get to play a character again is something not a lot of actors get to do.”

Sara Jane Goodman and Aaron Danos, who were both in “Tant Que Durera La Terre,” play two of the Crochet’s children, Topal and Arthur, respectively. Goodman was also in this year’s “Floating Palace” at the playhouse.

Martin said Jane Collins, who plays Evvie, is a jewel.

“I found an adorable little 11-year-old to play one of the children,” he said.

“I’ve known her for sometime,” Cheramie said. “Perry fell in love with her. She’s like that naturally.”

Martin, who owns the rights to “Doorstep” and has plans to adapt it into a musical, said some of the references, such as one to the Ural Mountains in Russia, were changed for the local audience.

For its run on Broadway in 1942, the play had well-known actors Louis Calhern and Dorothy Gish, sister of Lillian, playing Commodore and Mrs. Crochet. Goodrich and Hackett won a Pulitzer Prize for “The Diary of Anne Frank” and had adapted “Seven Brides for Seven Brothers” and “Father of the Bride” for the screen.

Still, the play lasted less than a month in New York. The story for Bayou Lafourche will be different, of course.

“It’s just a great story, like a Cajun ‘Fiddler on the Roof,'” Martin said. “It’s touching and extremely funny.”

“Doorstep” is onstage at the Bayou Playhouse (101 Main St. in Lockport) Nov. 13 through Dec. 13 on Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30 p.m. and Sundays at 2:30 p.m. Call 1-888-99 BAYOU (22968) for more information.

Actors Rick Duet, Jana Cheramie, Tanner Danos and Jane Collins bring “The Great Big Doorstep” to Bayou Playhouse in Lockport beginning this month. The 1940s Broadway comedy is about a poor Cajun family’s attempt to get a better home.