Midwestern Family Both Comic and Cruel in ‘The Fiery Furnace’

The American family, that endlessly examined subject of American playwrights,can be--in the right hands--an endlessly rewarding and mysterious source. In ways that can barely be measured but are unmistakably powerful, Timothy Mason’s “The Fiery Furnace” explores the emotional geography of a Midwestern clan through the ‘50s and ‘60s with the kind of wary but observant and semi-comic eye that recalls nothing less than Billy Wilder’s best films.

The Wilder comparison might not be apparent in another staging, but in director Judy Welden’s at the ever impressive Eclectic Company Theatre, it’s all there, from Ivy Jones’ vibrant, crusty performance as the matriarch Eunice to the effortless feeling of how amusing exchanges among wildly different people can turn cutting and cruel.

This saga of 13 years stays strictly in Eunice’s farmhouse kitchen (Sydney Z. Litwack’s set is a wonder of authenticity, down to the Corn Flakes box) but moves through vast human changes, as daughters Faith (Rachel Babcock) and Charity (D.J. Harner) grow from a kind of innocent naivete to bruised womanhood--in the case of Charity, real bruises. Eunice’s absurdly impulsive desire to leave husband Gunnar (who intriguingly never appears) is a preview of adulthood for the daughters, who move in hugely different circles: Faith to big-city Chicago, Charity down on the farm with alcoholic, bitter hubby Jerry (Joe Colligan).

Mason’s portrait of time passing, chances missed and glacial familial rifts is delivered by a pitch-perfect cast who have tapped into the play’s deep conviction that, even as they are undone by their flaws, characters always have a case to be made.

BE THERE

“The Fiery Furnace,” 5312 Laurel Canyon Blvd., North Hollywood. Fridays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7 p.m. Ends Aug. 13. $10-$15. (818) 508-3003. Running time: 1 hour, 50 minutes.