The Matchmaker , Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, Garrison, New York

The disruption politics and the post-pandemic upheaval of 2025 have rendered this year challenging and exhausting for many of us. I was experiencing much of this fatigue one Saturday last June when I boarded the train at Grand Central Station in New York City and headed up the Hudson River to Garrison where the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival (HVS) was performing Thornton Wilder’s The Matchmaker in repertoire with Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors. The tranquility of the region greeted me as I disembarked from the train and enjoyed a quick ride in the Festival’s shuttle van to the beautiful campus of HVS, where productions unfold under an open-sided tent allowing for shelter from the elements as well as for access to the natural scenic landscape of the grounds. On the way to the tent, I also glimpsed the construction of the Samuel H. Scripps Theater Center, a new state-of-the-art outdoor theater that will house HVS’s productions beginning in 2026. I was impressed by the thought and attention HVS committed to curating a theatrical experience for its audiences, and my anticipation for the afternoon’s performance of Wilder’s full-length farce was heightened.As the audience took their seats in the tent and awaited the start of act 1, I reviewed what I knew about the production history of The Matchmaker and reflected on whether those events contributed to why this gem of a script is not more widely known to contemporary audiences. Inspired by the comic plot of Johann Nestroy’s Einen Jux will er sich machen (1842) and drawing from the rich tradition of stock comic characters that have pervaded the genre from ancient times to the present, Wilder created an early version of this play, The Merchant of Yonkers. His biggest and most transformative addition to these models was the creation of Dolly Levi, a lovable, larger-than-life character determined to optimize her chances for wealth, love, and the best that life can offer. The famed director Max Reinhardt agreed to stage the premiere of The Merchant of Yonkers in 1938, first at the Colonial Theatre in Boston and then two weeks later at the Guild Theatre in New York City, where it ran for only thirty-nine performances. Audiences and critics found the production too somber and stiff, lacking the boisterous farce that Wilder had envisioned for the play and its characters (Collected Plays 848; Niven 468–72). Perhaps, however, something as simple as the title focused too much attention on Horace Vandergelder as the comic hero and not on Dolly Levi as the catalyst for many of the comic transformations in the script.Well over a decade passed before Wilder, at the encouragement of Ruth Gordon’s husband Garson Kanin, updated and retitled the script for production as The Matchmaker in 1954 at the Edinburgh Festival. This time, Tyrone Guthrie directed and Ruth Gordon starred as Dolly Levi; and, injected with a fresh comic spirit, the play pulsed with the energy it lacked in its earlier iteration. Success at Edinburgh led to further productions in London and a long Broadway run of 486 performances (Niven 624–26). Dolly Levi emerged as the comic heroine of the play and inspired a movie version of the script in 1958 directed by Joseph Anthony and starring Shirley Booth as Dolly Levi and Shirley MacLaine as Irene Molloy (Collected Plays 832) and the smash-hit musical Hello, Dolly! in 1964 that amassed 2,844 Broadway performances and attracted an array of star power to the title role (Niven 626). Although The Matchmaker lived on, Wilder did not participate in the writing of the screenplay or the musical libretto (Niven 646, 660).I was intrigued to see how director Davis McCallum would approach such a storied script at HVS. The open-sided tent revealed a three-quarter thrust stage with a sandy floor and raked semicircular seating, a playing space reminiscent in shape of a small Greek theater; there was no curtain, no fixed scenery, but the seating area afforded the cast exits and entranceways at various points. This minimalist approach to set design—in fact, the program listed only someone for “props design” (Buffy Cardoza) and not a separate set designer—called to mind the abstraction and non-realism of Our Town rather than the specificity and prop-laden world of The Matchmaker. How would McCallum evoke Horace Vandergelder’s Yonkers home and store, the hat shop of Irene Molloy, the Harmonia Gardens Restaurant, or the bohemian home of Flora Van Huysen? Minimalism proved ideal in this production: our imagination filled the gaps, if indeed any really existed, and the farce and slapstick humor of The Matchmaker allowed us to explore through comedy important philosophical questions about money and security, love and happiness, and the fragility and temporality of life itself.Act 1 introduces the audience to the widower Horace Vandergelder (Kurt Rhoads) and his daughter Ermengarde (Anvita Gattani), who desperately wants to marry the artist Ambrose Kemper (Blaize Adler-Ivanbrook). The natural setting on the open side of the tent provided the perfect “scenic” backdrop for an act set in Yonkers; the production was almost “site-specific” (Program). A carefully curated set of stage properties helped define in broad strokes Vandergelder’s feed shop. To these elements, McCallum and costume designer Charlotte Palmer Lane chose period costumes from the 1880s so the characters stood for us firmly in the past. Nonetheless, Wilder’s text and the thoughts of his characters hit a strikingly contemporary chord for audiences in 2025. Vandergelder opposes the marriage of Ermengarde and Ambrose and plans to put some distance between the young lovers in order to cool off the relationship (as in many other comedies, the lovers have made their own plans to thwart these obstacles).Vandergelder distrusts Ambrose because his profession is not practical. When Ambrose tries to reassure Vandergelder that he makes a fine living as an artist and can provide for Ermengarde, Vandergelder adds the charge of “foolishness” to his objections: “Let me tell you something, Mr. Kemper: most of the people in the world are fools. The law is there to prevent crime; we men of sense are there to prevent foolishness” (Collected Plays 288). In the capable hands of Kurt Rhoads, Vandergelder emerged as a lovable curmudgeon who, despite having prioritized sense over foolishness, wanted a second chance at love: “There’s nothing like mixing with women to bring out all the foolishness in a man of sense. And that’s a risk I’m willing to take” (Collected Plays 295). For this project, he has agreed to help from the titular matchmaker Dolly Levi (Nance Williamson), whose attempts to find Vandergelder a wife prove a ruse to win his heart and his hand in marriage. Nance Williamson and Kurt Rhoads are veteran performers on the HVS stage (as well as married in real life); their timing and chemistry carried the act as Dolly thwarts Vandergelder’s plans to marry Irene Molloy by persuading him to have dinner later that day with Miss Ernestina Simple, a fascinating (and no doubt imaginary) mystery woman. By the end of act 1, all characters from Yonkers as well as Dolly Levi are headed to the big city for an afternoon and evening of “foolishness.”In act 2, we are transported to the hat shop of Irene Molloy (Helen Cespedes) and her assistant Minnie Fay (Melissa Mahoney). The clerks from Vandergelder’s feed store, Cornelius Hackl (Carl Howell) and Barnaby Tucker (Tyler Bey), pop into Irene’s shop when they spot Vandergelder and Dolly on the streets of New York City, but, when they discover that the hat shop is Vandergelder’s destination, they hide in a cupboard and beneath a table to evade discovery. McCallum’s staging here was impeccable. With just two pieces of furniture and a tablecloth, the actors deftly executed timeworn slapstick routines. If I have any criticism of this scene, it is only that I yearned for the actors to throw themselves even more into these comic crowd-pleasers. Audience members seemed reluctant to laugh together (maybe it is just 2025!) and to share the communal spirit of comedy. We enjoyed ourselves in this act, but it took longer than usual for our optimism and good cheer to match the high jinks onstage. That said, right before intermission, when Vandergelder discovers the shenanigans at the shop and breaks off his courtship with Molloy, we were as carried away as the characters onstage. Irene’s suggestion that the clerks take her and Minnie to dinner at Harmonia Gardens seems perfectly plausible. No wonder then that, with three dollars between them, Cornelius and Barney agree (fig. 1).We returned from intermission to act 3 at the Harmonia Gardens Restaurant, represented on the HVS stage by two circular tables separated by a coat rack that prevented the occupants of one table from seeing those at the other. On stage right, we found Irene, Minnie, Cornelius, and Barnaby. The ladies are running up the bill, and the gentlemen are growing increasingly worried about their inability to pay at the end of the evening. On stage left, Vandergelder and Dolly took their seats; Dolly reveals that the phantom Miss Simple has eloped and can no longer join them for dinner. The two engage in a lively discussion about marriage, their own flaws and virtues, and life itself. The conversation is a joyful mix of first-date banter and the familiar give-and-take of old friends. As the act unfolds, the action at both tables finally collides and the various strands of the plot intertwine (fig. 2). McCallum orchestrated this scene with impeccable comic timing; the ensemble navigated the twists and turns of Wilder’s farce, propelling the audience through the comic confusion. As we anxiously awaited Vandergelder discovering his clerks dining with Irene Molloy at the nearby table, we also rejoiced seeing the characters of The Matchmaker begin to live, to spend their savings, and to enjoy a world that is often messy and imperfect.Although the slapstick gags and comic misunderstandings of acts 2 and 3 delighted the audience under the tent, the real power of this production, and of the script itself, emerged in act 4, where Wilder departs from the conventions of farce and traditional comic drama. The events of this act transpire at the home of Mrs. Flora Van Huysen, a friend of Vandergelder’s late wife. In a post-show conversation with McCallum, we discussed Wilder’s radical decision to introduce a new character so late in the play and to resolve the comic upheavals in the bohemian setting of this Greenwich Village living room. These choices underscore the lengths that the characters in The Matchmaker have traveled to escape their quotidian routines. Amidst coffee and gingerbread, the final comic mishaps are put to rest, and the play ends with the announcement of three weddings: Ermengarde and Ambrose Kemper, Irene Molloy and Cornelius Hackl, and Horace Vandergelder and Dolly Levi. But again, instead of leaving the audience with the sheer jubilation of these announcements, Wilder has Dolly ask her late husband Ephraim Levi for permission, or maybe forgiveness, to marry again: “I’m marrying Horace Vandergelder for his money. I’m going to send his money out doing all the things you taught me. Oh, it won’t be a marriage in the sense that we had one—but I shall certainly make him happy, and Ephraim—I’m tired. I’m tired of living from hand to mouth, and I’m asking your permission, Ephraim—will you give me away” (Collected Plays 363). The Matchmaker, and especially McCallum’s nuanced production, urges its audience to reflect upon the limitations of money and work in contemporary society; sensibility and money both confine us, but they also allow us to liberate ourselves and to live as “a fool among fools” rather than “a fool alone.” Our challenge is to know when to stop saving and start spending that capital, a true reflection of the work-life balance conversations that are dominating many industries in 2025.One additional delight was the music that McCallum infused into the production. The cast featured a small ensemble of musicians: Ripley Burke on the fiddle, Zachary Hobbs on the banjo, and Jim Keys on the accordion; and it included a variety of songs from the 1880s such as “The Map of New York City,” “The Sidewalks of New York,” and “Les Patineurs” waltz (Green; Program). This choice harkened back to a small controversy surrounding the 1938 Reinhardt production of The Merchant of Yonkers. Reinhardt was adamant that the staged version of the script needed singing and dancing; Wilder did not agree, claiming that American audiences preferred not to mix music with true storytelling. Reinhardt prevailed (Niven 470), and the HVS production is proof that music can be leveraged effectively to punctuate the convivial aspects of this farce.McCallum’s production of The Matchmaker brought out aspects of the script that I had never considered before. Many of the characters—Horace Vandergelder, Ambrose Kemper, Ermengarde, Irene Molloy, Dolly Levi—yearn for more excitement in their lives; they are tired of playing it safe and they model for the audience a path toward seizing adventure and embracing opportunities. I had never much associated The Matchmaker with Our Town (although The Merchant of Yonkers opened in 1938), but in Garrison that afternoon I saw a firm connection between the scripts: Act 4 of The Matchmaker was a comic reflection of the tragic ideas explored in act 3 of Our Town, both powerful calls to audiences and readers to optimize our limited time. I felt uplifted and energized as the shuttle van took me back to the station and I waited for the train back to Grand Central Station; I thought of Dolly Levi as I stood alongside the patio of Dolly’s Restaurant, a local establishment so named because scenes from the 1969 film adaptation of Hello, Dolly! were filmed in Garrison; and I thanked Davis McCallum for taking a chance on comedy amidst the disruption of 2025.