Las Vegas Weekly

March 6, 2009 · 5:09 PM

The Marriage Counselor comes to town

By Jennifer Grafiada

Watching Tyler Perry’s play The Marriage Counselor is much like attending a relationship seminar at church, except you laugh the entire time and actually enjoy the music.

You’ll be drawn into the living room of a married couple who argue, converse and tease each other with the room-shaking voices and spastic body language of a Hallelujah gospel choir.

As can be inferred from the title, the play deals with the perennial topic of marriage, its challenges and rewards and male-female dynamics. All of this, along with Perry’s vibrant characters (a weed-smoking father, a bible-thumping mother-in-law and an exotic dancer), proves to be endlessly funny.

The play is a musical, so Perry’s usual comedy is broken up with songs belted out by actors and actresses who are more than qualified to call themselves singers. Lively and entertaining, the play balances familiar domesticity, bedroom humor and a religious, uplifting message.

Perry’s all-black, effervescent cast will perform three shows at Planet Hollywood before heading off on the rest of their tour, including a week of performances in New York, before wrapping up at the end of April--another success to add to Perry's long list: five hit movies, ten plays and a TV sitcom. Perry recently starred in the movie Madea Goes to Jail, which has been #1 at the box office for the past two weekends, but he does not appear in The Marriage Counselor, which he wrote, directed and produced.

The play is also available on DVD (clips of the play are on YouTube: Clip) along with Perry’s film hits like Diary of a Mad Black Woman and Medea Goes to Jail.

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