Chagrin Falls playwrights bring the humor and humanity of ‘Erma Bombeck: At Wit’s End’ to Cleveland Play House

Published: Jul. 26, 2023

Pam Sherman as Erma Bombeck in the 2018 Geva Theatre production of "Erma Bombeck: At Wit’s End." (Photo by Ron Heerkens, Jr.)

By: Joey Morona, cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Cleveland Play House kicks off its 108th season in September. But before that, America’s first professional regional theater presents “Erma Bombeck: At Wit’s End,” a one-woman show about the beloved American columnist and humorist, for a summertime run.

Making its local premiere on July 29 and playing through Aug. 20 at the Outcalt Theatre in Playhouse Square, the play tells the story of the Dayton native who became known as “America’s Favorite Housewife” in the 1960s. Bombeck gave a voice to everyday women, saying out loud what a generation of stay-at-home moms was thinking through her nationally syndicated newspaper column, many books, and frequent television appearances.

The show was written by Allison and Margaret Engel, identical twins originally from Chagrin Falls. Pam Sherman, a former lawyer turned actress turned USA Today columnist, plays Bombeck. CPH interim artistic director Mark Cuddy directs.

“It means everything,” said Allison when asked about bringing the play to their hometown. “We’re such Cleveland fans and miss it so much.”

From fans to biographers

Margaret and Allison Engel graduated from Chagrin Falls High School in 1969.

“Our class was the one that began the pumpkin roll,” noted Allison, who now lives in Los Angeles.

From there, each sister went on to distinguished careers in journalism. In 2010, they teamed up on their first play, “Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins,” about another trailblazing female journalist and humorist. Bombeck’s longtime agent Aaron Priest saw the show and gave the sisters a call.

“He said, Erma is a journalist who didn’t get the recognition she deserved and should get equal treatment on the stage, too,” said Margaret, calling from her home in Washington, D.C. “He started to explain who Erma was, and we said there’s no need for that. We were longtime fans of Erma being from Ohio and we read her every day in The Plain Dealer.”

Bombeck began her career as a journalist at the Dayton Journal Herald before becoming a full-time mother and homemaker in the early 1950s. She began writing a column for the Dayton Shopping News in 1954 and, later, the Kettering-Oakwood Times and then the Dayton Journal Herald. In 1965, the column was picked up by newspapers across the nation. She wrote about the daily challenges of being a suburban mother and a wife with a sharp wit. Allison and Margaret’s mother was one of Bombeck’s early fans and introduced the column to the girls. Each day, they’d rush home after school to read it.

“We still read her,” Margaret said. “She was the largest syndicated column in this country and it will never be equaled. She was in more than 900 newspapers-- more than Art Buchwald, more than George Will, etc., etc.”

“She had a way (of writing) that was not sappy and sentimental or greeting-card-like but really struck a nerve along with some humor,” Allison added. “Even the poignant columns were funny.”

Getting to know ‘The Socrates of the Ironing Board’

Bombeck died in 1996. So, beyond pouring over her writings and TV appearances, the playwrights spent time with her husband Bill (who passed away in 2018) and their children Betsy, Andrew and Matthew to fill in the blanks. Allison even looked at old photo albums with them at the family’s home in Scottsdale, Arizona. Erma’s IBM Selectric typewriter was still there before it was shipped off to the Smithsonian.

During those visits, the Engels learned just how devoted a mother Erma really was. She wrote her columns only when the kids were away at school. In fact, her children didn’t really have a clear idea of what she did for a living because when they got home she was just “Mom.”

“When her youngest, Matt, was in kindergarten, the teacher went around and asked everyone what their parents did,” Allison recalled. “He told them that his mother was a syndicated communist. That’s what he thought his Mom did.”

But there was more to Erma Bombeck than the humor, wit and wisdom, the sisters discovered.

“One thing we I think we were all surprised about was how political she was,” Margaret said. “She cared very deeply about the Equal Rights Amendment. She spent two years on her own dime traveling the country with Liz Carpenter, head of ERAmerica, trying to get it passed and was devastated when it fell short by three states.”

Bringing Erma to Life

“Erma Bombeck: At Wit’s End” premiered at Arena Stage in Washington, D.C. in 2015 and has played theaters across the country in the years since. In 2018, the production came to the Geva Theatre in Rochester, New York, where Cuddy was the artistic director at the time. For Erma, he had the idea to cast a local woman named Pam Sherman. She had an interesting career arc that, he thought, made her perfect for the part. Sherman was a lawyer who gave it up mid-career to pursue acting, her original passion, before giving it up again to start a column similar to Bombeck’s in scope. “The Suburban Outlaw” focused on family life in the suburbs and ran for 15 years in USA Today and more than 50 other Gannett-owned newspapers.

“My inspirations were absolutely Erma Bombeck and Anna Quindlen, amazing female columnists who told the truth about their lives,” Sherman said.

Before starting the column, she bought all of Bombeck’s books.

“I was trying to figure out what was going to be the mission for this column and laughing out loud at ‘If Life Is a Bowl of Cherries, What Am I Doing in the Pits?’” Sherman remembered. “But then I said to myself, I have to stop reading this because I need to develop my own voice and not her voice, which is ironic now.”

Cuddy’s instincts proved right. The Rochester Democrat & Chronicle called Sherman “an engaging storyteller (who) captures Bombeck’s trademark wit and the nutty stuff that every family goes through.” And in Denver, a theater critic wrote, ”Sherman does a masterful job playing Bombeck — one zinger after another.”

“Erma Bombeck was one of the most admired women in America. She was on the list for decades,” said Margaret Engel. “I think Pam captures those qualities that made people like and admire her.”

A timeless story

How do you go turn a story about a 1960s homemaker who wrote about marriage and raising children into something that would appeal to a 21st-century audience? Turns out, the authors didn’t need to change anything.

“We were worried when we started doing research that the play might be dated or her words might be dated,” Allison said. “But, man, they are just as relevant and poignant and funny now as they were when she wrote them.”

“I think it’s absolutely timeless,” Sherman agreed.

“There’s so little understanding of what goes on behind closed doors in America and she was so insightful (about that). It wasn’t about overflowing dishwashers or those kind of comic household disasters. It’s all about personal relationships,” Margaret added. “So, when we watch the audience, they’re laughing with knowing laughs about things that no one really had ever put in print or discussed before.”

As identical twins, Margaret and Allison often have the same thought at the same time -- they were tested for ESP as children and once unknowingly bought the same car in the same color as adults. Still, they’ve been surprised by the reaction “Erma Bombeck: At Wit’s End” has received from the audience.

“It’s often the men who are weepy or crying because I think they appreciate so much more what their mother did to captain the ship, and how little recognition they got for that very tough role in life,” Margaret said.

Cleveland Play House’s production of “Erma Bombeck: At Wit’s End” is playing at Playhouse Square’s Outcalt Theatre, 1407 Euclid Ave., from July 29 to Aug. 20. Tickets are $25-$70 and can be purchased at clevelandplayhouse.com.