2007 - 2008 Season

Harvey

Written by Mary Chase

Directed by Mary Ann Green

October 4, 5, 6, 7, 11, 12, 13, 2007

When Elwood P. Dowd starts to introduce his imaginary friend, Harvey, a six-and-a-half-foot rabbit, to guests at a society party, his sister, Veta, has seen as much of his eccentric behavior as she can tolerate. She decides to have him committed to a sanitarium to spare her daughter, Myrtle Mae, and their family from future embarrassment. Problems arise, however, when Veta herself is mistakenly assumed to be on the verge of lunacy when she explains to doctors that years of living with Elwood's hallucination have caused her to see Harvey also! The doctors commit Veta instead of Elwood, but when the truth comes out, the search is on for Elwood and his invisible companion. When he shows up at the sanitarium looking for his lost friend Harvey, it seems that the mild-mannered Elwood's delusion has had a strange influence on more than one of the doctors. Only at the end does Veta realize that maybe Harvey isn't so bad after all.

Babes in Toyland

Directed by Lynnette Kenworthy

November 29, 30, December 1, 2, 2007

With fresh music, this classic tale will wow your audiences, both young and old. The villainous Barnaby has fallen in love with sweet Mistress Mary Quite Contrary. If he can't buy her love, then he'll force her to marry him by threatening to foreclose on her mother, the poor Widow Piper. Mary already has her heart set on marrying Barnaby's nephew Alan-but not if Barnaby can help it! He 

hires two bumbling ruffians to do away with Alan, but Alan returns to Mother Goose Land amidst much rejoicing. Mary journeys to the mysterious Toyland through the dangerous Spider Forest. But wait! Barnaby hasn't given up, and he herds the whole gang of Mother Goose Land characters to Toyland in pursuit of Mary. There we encounter the magical mystery of Toyland as we meet the Master Toymaker and his quirky assistants Grumio and Marmaduke.

Marvin’s Room

Written by Scott McPherson

Directed by Mary Helen Watson

January 17, 18, 19, 20, 24, 25, 26, 2008

Bessie lives in Florida where she cares for her aunt and ailing father, Marvin. Aunt Ruth has several collapsed vertebrae and has to wear an electrode pack on her waist with which she can both control her constant pain and open and close her garage door at will. Unable to speak, and confined to his bed for years, Marvin's only entertainment comes from someone bouncing beams of sunlight, reflected from a small mirror, around his room. Bessie learns amidst all this illness that she has leukemia and that her only hope is to contact her long-estranged sister Lee to see if her bone marrow is compatible for a transplant. Lee reluctantly makes the trip to Florida from Ohio, bringing along her two sons, one of whom has just been released from an institution after a wave of arson. The reunion of the sisters is uneasy at best, with long buried recriminations coming to the surface even as love slowly overwhelms Lee's veneer of selfishness and glib denial. Bessie's challenge becomes to reunite Lee and her son Hank before he rejects her forever for her years of neglect. One by one, Lee and her sons are tested for the transplant, but none of them will be able to donate to Bessie who, for the moment, seems to have gone into remission. Against Lee's urging that Bessie take it easy, Bessie refuses to condemn Aunt Ruth and her father to nursing homes, claiming that only by caring for them herself will she make her own illness bearable. During a trip to Disneyland, Bessie collapses. Lee and Hank, however, have finally begun to communicate as a result of Bessie's attentions to them both. As the bad news accumulates, the play ends with Bessie taking shelter in her only refuge: In answer to her father's cries of discomfort, she selflessly abandons her own despair and helps him to bounce the day's remaining sunlight around his room.

Captain Bree and Her Lady Pirates

Directed by Lynnette Kenworthy

March 20, 21, 22, 23, 2008

Shiver your timbers with this swashbuckling musical comedy! Captain Jennings’ crew jumps ship, leaving him with only a handful of prisoners and Fergus, a sailor who can’t swim, to protect his wealthy passengers from a pirate attack. Captain Bree and her lady pirates demand gold in exchange for the lives of the pretentious Madam Prescot; her nephew Samuel, who is masquerading as a girl to avoid becoming shark bait; and her niece Julia, bursting with desire to join the lady pirates—much to her aunt’s dismay! While waiting for a response from the English, the pirates entertain themselves by teaching Julia the ropes of pirating, such as threatening their prisoners with the plank. But what is in store when a British fleet arrives, set on both hanging the pirates for their deeds and punishing Captain Jennings for not fighting them off more effectively? With catchy sea shanties and other rousing musical numbers, your audience will be humming along all the way to the exciting surprise ending! 

Lost in Yonkers

Written by Neil Simon

Directed by Mike Glasscock

April 24, 25, 26, 27, May 1, 2, 3, 2008

By America's great comic playwright, this memory play is set in a Yonkers in 1942 features another battling odd couple, this time an old woman and her 35 year old daughter played in the hit Broadway production to great acclaim by Irene Worth and Mercedes Ruehl. Bella, the daughter, is a retarded, pathetically affectionate and more than enough for Grandma Kurnitz to manage. As the play opens, son Eddie deposits his two young sons on the old lady's doorstep. He is in debt and needs to go on an extended sales trip to make some money. The boys must contend with Grandma, a stern, tough old lady; with Bella and her secret romance, and with Louie, her brother, who may have mob connections. Gradually, the mood deepens and darkens as the boys endure life with a family of emotionally crippled people. While the children are only temporarily exiled in Yonkers, the rest of their sad, funny family is truly lost.

The Foreigner

Written by Larry Shue

Directed by Rick Patrick

June 5, 6, 7, 8, 12, 13, 14, 2008

The scene is a fishing lodge in rural Georgia often visited by "Froggy" LeSeuer, a British demolition expert who occasionally runs training sessions at a nearby army base. This time "Froggy" has brought along a friend, a pathologically shy young man named Charlie who is overcome with fear at the thought of making conversation with strangers. So "Froggy," before departing, tells all assembled that Charlie is from an exotic foreign country and speaks no English. Once alone the fun really begins, as Charlie overhears more than he should—the evil plans of a sinister, two-faced minister and his redneck associate; the fact that the minister's pretty fiancée is pregnant; and many other damaging revelations made with the thought that Charlie doesn't understand a word being said. That he does fuels the nonstop hilarity of the play and sets up the wildly funny climax in which things go uproariously awry for the "bad guys," and the "good guys" emerge triumphant.