When someone retires, they’re supposed to get all community oriented and take in all those local plays, concerts, and all that other communal artsy fartsy stuff. Actually, I’ve been doing this ever since I moved to north Texas. Although some of the good ole boy bubbas I used to work with would often scoff at my live theater appreciation, I’ve liked going to live theater since college. Being a broadcasting major I was forced to take a theater lighting class, and during this class I filled in as the lighting crew chief on the theater department’s production of Romeo and Juliet. I saw that play so many times I swear I had the first act memorized. “Tis but thy name is my enemy. Though art thyself, though not a Montague. What is a Montague? It is not hand, nor foot……..” Yea, I could go on and on.
My town of Sherman, Texas has a pretty decent community playhouse, and although I’ve never seen any Shakespeare there, I’ve seen everything from the traditional[EW1] classics like The King and I, The Music Man, and South Pacific to the more contemporary classics like Sweeney Todd, Jesus Christ Superstar, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The local talent that appears in these productions hail from a fifty-mile radius that stretches down into the northern suburbs of Dallas and up into southern Oklahoma. Although a lot of the folks who display their talents are drama students and teachers from the local colleges and high schools, anyone can audition. In fact, I’ve known people from work who were mild mannered engineers and technicians by day and dedicated thespians by night!
When the local theater decided to put on Little Shop of Horrors several years ago, I was actually tempted to go audition myself. However, my uncle passed away around that time, and his funeral, which took place near Tulsa, just happened to be on the weekend of the auditions. I saw this as a sign from the Almighty telling me that perhaps I should support the local art scene by buying tickets and sitting in the audience.
Even though half the productions that the local playhouse puts on are musicals, there are plenty of plays that don’t require and orchestra. Over the years, I’ve seen Run for Your Wife, Arsenic and Old Lace, The Odd Couple, and a ton of others. This month the local theater crowd was treated with the nonmusical production of The Play That Goes Wrong, and here’s a little rundown of it.
THE PLAY THAT GOES WRONG
Before Margaret and I had even walked across the parking lot toward the Finley Playhouse we heard some guy calling for a dog. “Winston!” a fellow in a tuxedo screamed out from the sidewalk in front of the small theater. Okay, that was something I had never seen during any of the times I had been to any theater. As soon as we were shown to our seats, the staff circulated through the theater asking if anyone had seen a small, Toto like dog. “Look under your seats for Winston,” some lady instructed. “We’ve lost him, and he’s part of the play!” All I could think was, “Doesn’t the dog have an understudy?” I told Margaret if worse came to worse, I could fill in for the wayward pooch. If I had any kind of dignity, it was lost long ago, and playing the part of a dog on stage didn’t seem like that much of a stretch for me.
However, the lost dog seemed to be just part of the problems that were going on in the small community theater. Several folks wearing black “STAFF” shirts milled around the stage armed with power drills in a last-minute effort of trying to put the set together while the stage manager was asking those in the audience if anyone had seen his lost Duran Duran CD. Okay, not your normal pre play theater practices, but it’s community theater, so stuff happens. Never fear though, because this was all just part of the production of the play, The Play That Goes Wrong!
Basically this is a play about a play. A play that goes very wrong. It all starts off with the MC telling how the production house’s budget had been slashed for the season, and their production of James and the Giant Peach had been reduced down to simply, James and the Peach. Okay, so that got the vibe going.
The fake play that was being carried out in the actual play was a murder mystery, where some rich guy, who had recently become engaged, is found dead in the opening scene. Of course, the actor’s portrayal of a dead man was hampered a bit due to the other cast members accidently stepping on his hand throughout the opening scene. Then there was the butler who kept reading his lines from his palm while mispronouncing half his words.
If that wasn’t insane enough, the actress who was playing the victim’s fiancé is suddenly knocked out cold on stage, and a stagehand is pushed onto the stage to take her place. With a dark wig and a red dress thrown on over her “STAFF” shirt, the girl plays the role while reading most of her lines from a script, including the parts she’s not supposed to say. She does this until she drops the script and mixes up all the scenes. Then the set starts falling apart. Yea, it got pretty crazy.
Then comes the dog Winston, who was apparently never found. So we have a guy dragging an empty leash around the stage yelling, “Down Winston! Down!” And to add to everything else, during the dramatic stage music, the sounds of Duran Duran suddenly breaks in as the stage manager yells, “Oh! Found my CD!” It’s all pretty darn hilarious, and in all reality, this would have been a great play to be in. If you forget your lines or miss your cue or screw up in anyway, it would have just been seen as part of the play! Of course, there’s always the danger that one of the set walls might fall down on top of you.
I'm Retired! Now what? 
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