Life is short. Follow your heart.

A few weeks ago, I talked with a friend’s teenage granddaughter. She loves theater and wants to pursue acting as a career, but her parents aren’t keen on the idea. They want her to get a degree in something more marketable.

So she’s agreed to have a double major in college: theater and chemical engineering. I’m scared she’s going to play it safe and will become a chemical engineer who’ll say, “You know, I used to want to act.”

On the other hand, another woman I know studied acting in college. Since then, she’s done some impressive stage work and is starting to get some TV roles. Doors are beginning to open for her now in her career.

She told me once that she purposefully had no Plan B to fall back on, just in case she didn’t make it in acting. That way, she figured, she’d have to make her acting career work because there was no contingency plan. She’s pursuing her passion and has no regrets about it.

Jackie Schram, David S. Howard, Chris Clavelli and Carrie Lund in “You Can’t Take it With You.” COURTESY PHOTO I was thinking about these two women after seeing “You Can’t Take It With You” at the Florida Repertory Theatre, because this 75-year-old classic is all about following your heart and doing what you enjoy in life.

We only have a limited time on this earth, reasons Martin Vander, the patriarch of the Sycamore family. Why not spend it doing what you love?

To outsiders, the Sycamore family may seem out of step with the rest of the world. But they don’t care one bit, much to the consternation of daughter Alice (Christine Perez.) She’s fallen for Tony (John West), the boss’s son, and she’s scared her wildly eccentric family might scare him off.

Her mother, Penny (Carrie Lund), eats candy out of a human skull and spends her days writing plays after a typewriter was accidentally delivered to the house eight years ago. Her father, Paul (Bruce Somerville), makes fireworks in the basement at all hours of the day and night with Mr. DePinna (Chris Clavelli). Her sister, Essie (Jackie Schram), married to Ed (Adam Jones), wants to be a ballerina. She leaps about the house, her face set with fierce determination. In her spare time, she creates candies, which her husband delivers to people. Essie’s Russian ballet teacher, Mr. Kolenkhov (Avi Hoff- man), shows up regularly to give her lessons, even though he confesses privately that she has no talent. And her grandfather, Martin Vanderhof (David S. Howard), walked out on his job 35 years ago. He spends his time raising snakes and attending graduations and circuses for entertainment.

But Tony doesn’t mind Alice’s family.

Every family has its own quirks, he reasons. After all, his father (Dick Boyd) raises expensive orchids and his mother (Kim Ostrenko) believes in spiritualism.

But the Sycamore family is utterly unpredictable and shockingly unconventional, as the very conservative Kirbys learn when they show up for dinner with the Sycamores a day early.

Written by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart, “You Can’t Take It With You” won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1937. It was so popular Frank Capra made it into a movie the following year. (It won the Academy Award for Best Picture.)

And with this endearing production, it’s easy to see why.

Putting on a period piece such as this is an endeavor filled with many potential pitfalls. The actors can be too wacky, or overly sentimental. They may express a modern sensibility rather than a 1936 mindset. If not done well, this three-hour long, three-act play can drag.

But this charming production of “You Can’t Take It With You” hits the perfect tone. You not only enjoy these people, but you come to care about them. (Afterwards, I discovered in my notes that at one point during the show, I’d jotted down: “I want to live with these people.”)

Richard Crowell’s realistic set is a living room stuffed with all sorts of interesting things: paintings, a dartboard, a printing press, a xylophone, a big brass drum, a butterfly net… even a stuffed boar’s head wearing a wedding veil. It’s a comfortable, well lived-in house that reflects the varied interests of its inhabitants.

But the house is just as full of love as it is things. These people so obviously love each other and delight in each other’s company. They support each oth- er’s interests. They’re demonstrative and affectionate with each other. I believed this was truly a family, not a group of actors thrown together.

Director Robert Cacioppo has not only cast this play well, but his loving touches can be seen everywhere, from the staging to the music chosen, to even a clever scene change in the first act. (I think this is the first time I’ve seen a scene change applauded.)

This is an ensemble piece, with 19 actors, so it’s impossible to highlight everyone’s performance. Ms. Schram’s awkward dancing had the audience in stitches; they often applauded her inept, overwrought moves. She and her husband, played by Mr. Jones, make a winsome couple. Mr. Clavelli again displays his talent of disappearing into a character and creating someone who, though humorous, is realistic.

Ms. Perez and Mr. West are quite wonderful as the young lovers, especially their scene in Act I when they return home from their first date. Their conversation is a ballet of shy glances, awkward silences, blurted sentences. And when they finally confess their love to each other, your heart cheers. The tenderness between them is quite believable.

Christine Peete, as Rheba, the Sycamore’s maid, has a funny scene setting the table, and Leah Thomas strikes comedic gold with a walk-on scene in Act II as a drunk actress who comes to the house to read Penny’s plays, only to pass out. Ms. Ostrenko, a lastminute substitution, does excellent double duty as the ice-queen Mrs. Kirby, and the dramatic Grand Duchess Olga Katrina.

And Mr. Howard is, as always, remarkable. His realistic and understated performance as the patriarch of the family is like watching Fred Astaire dance: he makes it look so easy, so effortless, as if he’s really not doing much at all. His comments come across as heartfelt statements, not as sappy sentimentality, preachiness, or clichés.

And it’s an off-stage character whose career choice speaks volumes. Grandpa meets a policeman on the corner every night to talk. He studied to be a doctor, but secretly wanted to be a policeman. At Grandpa’s urging, he became one, and is very happy.

“You Can’t Take It With You” urges us all to reevaluate our lives. Are we spending them doing the things we love?

We each only have a finite time on this earth.

Spending three hours of that time with the Sycamores is highly recommended. 

If you go

>> What: “You Can’t Take It With You”
>> When: through Feb. 26
>> Where: Florida Repertory Theatre,
2267 Bay Street in the historic
Arcade Theatre in downtown Fort
Myers, between Hendry and Jackson
>> Cost: $42 and $38
>> Info: Call 332-4488 or go to
www.floridarep.org