Although summer does not officially start until next weekend, the Newnan Community Theatre Company is already planning an ambitious 2014-15 theatre season. Here are some highlights of the recently-released schedule:
• Sordid Lives
August 28 – September 7
A black comedy about white trash! The author of “Daddy’s Dyin’ (Who’s Got the Will?” brings you a comedy that was nominated for over thirty awards during its long run in Los Angeles. When Peggy, a good Christian woman, hits her head on the sink and bleeds to death after tripping over her lover’s wooden legs in a motel room, chaos erupts in Winters, Texas. It is said that funerals bring out the best and worst in everyone, and everyone in Winters, Texas proves this adage to be true in this Del Shores play.
• The Gin Game
September 25 – October 5
This winner of the 1978 Pulitzer Prize uses a card game as a metaphor for life. Weller Martin is playing solitaire on the porch of a seedy nursing home. Enter Fonsia Dorsey, a prim, self-righteous lady.
They discover they both dislike the home and enjoy gin rummy, so they begin to play and to reveal intimate details of their lives. Fonsia wins every time and their secrets become weapons used against one another.
Weller longs for a victory to counter a lifetime of defeats, but it doesn’t happen. He leaves the stage a broken man and Fonsia realizes her self-righteous rigidity has led to an embittered, lonely old age.
• The Rocky Horror Show
October 23 – November 2
Dr. Frank N. Furter and his motley crew are doing the time warp once again! A humorous tribute to the science fiction and horror B-movies of the late 1940s through early 1970s, the musical tells the story of a newly engaged couple getting caught in a storm and coming to the home of a mad transvestite scientist unveiling his new creation, a muscle man named Rocky Horror. This deliberately kitschy rock ‘n’ roll sci-fi gothic madness has been entertaining audiences since 1974, and is as much fun as ever!
• Prelude to a Kiss
November 13 – 23
At Peter and Rita’s wedding, a mysterious old man insists on kissing the bride. While honeymooning, Peter gradually realizes that the woman by his side is not his wife. The wedding kiss caused Rita’s soul and the old man’s to change places. Peter must track down the old man and free his young love’s spirit trapped in an aging and diseased body before it’s too late. This study in love, romance, and the magic of both has been entrancing audiences since its premiere in 1988. .
• A Christmas Carol: The Musical
December 4 – 14
The classic story of Ebenezer Scrooge and his conversion from grumpy, hateful miser to a renewed and hopeful man has been a Christmas classic since Dickens first put words to paper. This version of the story, with script and music by Newnan’s own Dale Lyles, has been a favorite of Newnan Theatre Company audiences for years. Lyles has now rewritten both script and musical score to bring a newer and better production to a new generation of NTC audiences, and Newnan Theatre Company is proud to premiere this new version of the show!
•The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen’s Guild Dramatic Society’s Production of “A Christmas Carol”
December 16 – 21
The ladies of the F.A.H.E.T.G.D.S. are ever-so dedicated to their craft, and this production, about a fictional amateur drama group that stumbles in its attempts to bring to life on stage Scrooge, Tiny Tim, and the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Future, and Present shows their dedication to the holiday season as well. In the midst of a blizzard, most of the cast is stuck in transit. The three ladies who have made it to the theatre decide the show must go on. Actors try their best, botch their lines, and argue while trying to perform – but the show goes on in all of its festive, comedic glory.
Please note that The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen’s Guild Dramatic Society’s Production of “A Christmas Carol” will run Tuesday through Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m.
•Almost, Maine
January 22 – February 1, 2015
On a cold, clear, moonless night in the middle of winter, all is not quite what it seems in the remote, mythical town of Almost, Maine. As the northern lights hover in the star-filled sky above, Almost’s residents find themselves falling in and out of love in unexpected and often hilarious ways. Knees are bruised. Hearts are broken. But the bruises heal, and the hearts mend—almost—in this delightful midwinter night’s dream.
•Twelve Angry Men
February 26 – March 8, 2015
A 19-year-old man has just stood trial for the fatal stabbing of his father. “He doesn’t stand a chance,” mutters the guard as the 12 jurors are taken into the bleak jury room. It looks like an open-and-shut case—until one of the jurors begins opening the others’ eyes to the facts. “This is a remarkable thing about democracy,” says one juror, “that we are notified by mail to come down to this place—and decide on the guilt or innocence of a man; of a man we have not known before. We have nothing to gain or lose by our verdict. We should not make it a personal thing.” But personal it does become, with each juror revealing his own character as the various testimonies are re-examined, the murder is re-enacted and a new murder threat is born before their eyes! Tempers get short, arguments grow heated, and the jurors become 12 angry men. The jurors’ final verdict and how they reach it—in tense scenes that have electrified audiences and kept them on the edge of their seats for over 40 years.
•Into the Woods
March 19 – 29, 2015
The Brothers Grimm hit Broadway with an epic fairytale where worlds collide. James Lapine and Stephen Sondheim take everyone’s favorite storybook characters and brings them together for a timeless yet relevant piece and rare modern classic. The story follows a Baker and his wife who wish to have a child, Cinderella who wishes to attend the King’s Festival, and Jack who wishes his cow would give milk. When the Baker and his wife learn that they cannot have a child because of a Witch’s curse, the two set off on a journey to break the curse. Everyone’s wish is granted, but the consequences of their actions return to haunt them later with disastrous results.
•American Buffalo
April 16 – 26, 2015
In a Chicago junk shop three small time crooks plot to rob a man of his coin collection, the showpiece of which is a valuable “Buffalo nickel”. These high-minded grifters fancy themselves businessmen pursuing legitimate free enterprise. But the reality of the three- Donny, the oafish junk shop owner; Bobby, a young junkie Donny has taken under his wing and “Teach”, a violently paranoid braggart- is that they are merely pawns caught up in their own game of last-chance, dead-end, empty pipe dreams.
