Intermission: Culture clash makes 'Greek Wedding' movie entertaining

Nia Vardalos, a member of the legendary Second City comedy troupe, has adapted her one-woman show, "My Big Fat Greek Wedding," for the movie screen. She heads the delightful cast in a romantic comedy that is far removed from the formula pieces of this genre that Hollywood usually turns out. It's a charming, heartwarming piece loaded with the kind of humor that will have anyone with relatives saying, "This has happened to me "

When Vardalos was performing her show, Rita Wilson that's Mrs. Tom Hanks to you and me saw it one evening. She was knocked out, and she and Hanks decided to produce the film version.

Director Joel Zwick, whose credits are mostly TV-related, signed on, and the cast was rounded out with a load of ethnic actors: Michael Constantine, Lainie Kazan, Andrea Martin and John Corbett. John Corbett? He's not Greek. He's the guy from "Northern Exposure," last seen as Sara Jessica Parker's boyfriend on "Sex and the City." He's Anglo, and that is a pivotal point on which the plot of "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" turns.

"Greek girls were put on Earth for three things: To marry a Greek boy, raise a whole lot of Greek babies and to feed everyone until the day they die." Thus begins the tale of Toula Portokalos (Vardalos), who narrates the film and is its central character.

We see Toula as a child, going to Greek school when other girls her age were going to Brownies. "If Nick has nine horses and Maria has one, how soon will they marry?" is a typical math problem at Greek school. There are some other great quotes from the childhood scenes, too, as mother Maria (Kazan) admonishes her son for playing with his food. "When I was young we didn't have food," she explains.

When we cut to the present, we find Toula as a waitress um better make that "seating hostess," at Dancing Zorbas, the Greek diner owned by her mom and her Greek-to-the-bone dad, Gus (Constantine.) Give Gus any word, including a word like "kimono," and he can cite its Greek origins.

Gus, who also believes any ailment can be cured with Windex, is worried about Toula. She's 30 and not married. Toula is worried too. She wants to do something besides work in the family business, and she longs for a lover, but maybe not the kind of guy Gus has in mind.

After much ado, Toula convinces Gus to let her take some classes at the local college. This sparks a Cinderella-type transformation. Toula sheds her glasses for contacts, changes her hair and gets some less-frumpy outfits.

After taking a computer class, she goes to work at her aunt's travel agency. There she meets Ian Miller (Corbett), a decidedly Anglo-Saxon young man who seems to have an eye for her. They begin dating but Toula has to keep things secret, both from her family, where "no one has ever gone out with a non-Greek," as well as from Ian, whom she fears will bail when he discovers her 27 cousins, her various aunts and uncles and most of all, father Gus.

Ian has two cousins and a set of parents who play a hilarious staid counterpart to Toula's family a family that has two settings: loud and louder.

When Ian asks Toula to marry him, she realizes worlds will collide, and at this point the movie gets down to the meat of the plot. And speaking of meat, besides being a non-Greek, Ian is also a vegetarian. "That's OK. I cook lamb," says Toula's aunt when she invites the couple to dinner.

Another great dinner scene unfolds when Ian and Toula bring his folks for a quiet evening with Maria and Gus. Toula doesn't know, but Gus has invited the whole family over and as the Millers pull up, they find a gathering of Greeks roasting lamb on spits in the front yard.

Despite the difficulties, plans for the wedding (now out of the hands of Ian and Toula) continue, and the last act of "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" features the affair itself.

Vardalos has done a great job turning an autobiographical monologue into a full-blown screenplay, and I enjoyed every minute of this film. It ranks with other wedding movies such as "Muriel's Wedding" and Mira Nair's beautiful "Monsoon Wedding." I also caught glimpses of Norman Jewison's "Moonstruck" here.

Which leads me to a question: A film like this one has such broad appeal to so many different age groups, why did I have to drive to Branson to see it? Does having the word "Greek" in the title conjure up images of a foreign film? It's playing at the Branson Movies 4 Theater.