{"id":11488,"date":"2019-06-21T16:33:21","date_gmt":"2019-06-21T16:33:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/?p=11488"},"modified":"2019-06-21T16:33:21","modified_gmt":"2019-06-21T16:33:21","slug":"the-worst-crimes-are-the-crimes-of-the-heart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/2019\/06\/21\/the-worst-crimes-are-the-crimes-of-the-heart\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018The Worst Crimes Are The Crimes Of The Heart\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Henley\u2019s masterpiece to begin the family-centric Fools\u2019 season<\/i><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

By Dana DuGan<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"
Seattle-based actors Tim Gouran and Sharon Barto are featured in Company of Fools\u2019 new production. Photo credit: Kirsten Shultz \/ Company of Fools<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Audiences love certain plays: the ones that are familiar, the ones that are humorous, and the ones with a happy ending. \u201cCrimes of the Heart\u201d falls into this pleasing category, but any self-respecting theatre company will take it further and deeper.<\/p>\n

Such is the case with Company of Fools, which will present Beth Henley\u2019s multi-award-winning play, beginning with a gala opening night, Friday, June 28, at the Liberty Theatre in Hailey. Doors will open at 6:30 p.m. for COF\u2019s new producing artistic director Scott Palmer to give a public lecture at and share background pertinent to the play. A no-host opening night party will be held after the performance at Sun Valley Brewery, in Hailey.<\/p>\n

\u201cCrimes of the Heart\u201d is the first show in COF\u2019s\u00a0 <\/span>24th season, which is dubbed Welcome To The Family, and will feature plays written by women, with mostly female casts, Palmer said.<\/p>\n

Set in 1974, the play revolves around the McGrath sisters who reunite in their hometown of Hazlehurst, Mississippi, after one of them shoots her abusive husband, while also awaiting news of their grandfather, who is dying in a local hospital.<\/p>\n

The play will feature Sharon Barto Gouran as Meg McGrath, Audra Honaker as Lenny McGrath, and Aly Wepplo as Babe McGrath Botrelle. The cast is rounded out by Tess Makenna as the McGrath cousin Chick, Tim Gouran as Doc Porter and David Janeski as Barnette Lloyd.<\/p>\n

Lenny is unmarried, and turning 30, though no one recalls that fact. Meg is a struggling singer, just returned from California, and the pistol-packing Babe is out on bail. Each one feels she\u2019s been betrayed somehow\u2014by their absent father, by the men they\u2019ve known and by life in general. Their troubles, which are grave, are also somehow hilarious and are boosted by the schemes of Chick, Doc Porter and Babe\u2019s lawyer, Barnette, who has his own vendetta to attend to. But the play ends on a high note, at least for the moment.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a thin veneer of Southern gentility that hides pain and scandals,\u201d said Palmer, who is also directing this production. \u201cThere\u2019s something truly epic about the South; it constricts but there\u2019s so much can one say with one phrase. There are so many layers underneath. It\u2019s Henley\u2019s writing but it\u2019s also the South.\u201d<\/p>\n

Janeski agreed. \u201cThere\u2019s something Beth Henley does in many of her works,\u201d he said. \u201cSomething beautiful and awful, together on stage in the same moment. Tragedy needs the comedy. It happens all the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCrimes\u201d was penned by a \u201cSouthern woman at a time when American theatre (particularly on Broadway) wasn\u2019t seeing a lot of work by women and featuring strong female characters,\u201d Palmer said. \u201cIt shattered expectations and opened the door to the idea that women playwrights, and plays that focus on women\u2019s stories, were not only important but could also be commercially successful.\u201d<\/p>\n

Palmer pointed out that the play\u2019s themes and cast have some interesting connections to the Wood River Valley, and Company of Fools, in particular. In 2015, to continue working with COF, Wepplo and Janeski moved from Richmond, Va., which was founded there.<\/p>\n

Barto grew up in the Valley, and was introduced to theatre through COF. She has returned from Seattle with her husband Gouran for this production.<\/p>\n

\u201cOddly enough, [she] plays a character who returns to her hometown and grapples with the things that have changed and the things that have stayed the same,\u201d Palmer said. \u201cAudra has a long history of performing with The Fools, and was a great friend of John Glenn\u2019s. She lives in Richmond, where The Fools got their start. These women are remarkably talented, well-trained, and deeply connected to this theatre and this place. It feels oddly appropriate for each of them, with their different histories with The Fools, to be playing these roles.\u201d<\/p>\n

Besides Palmer, the crew includes scenic design by Joe Lavigne, costume design by Melissa Heller, lighting design by Steve Koehler, sound design by Chris Henderson, dialect coaching by Ann Price, technical direction by Patrick Szczotka, and production management by K.O. Ogilvie.<\/p>\n

\u201cCrimes of the Heart\u201d will run through Saturday, July 13. Tickets are available at the Liberty Theatre box office during business hours, online at sunvalleycenter.org\/companyoffools or by calling (208) 578-9122.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Henley\u2019s masterpiece to begin the family-centric Fools\u2019 season By Dana DuGan Audiences love certain plays: the ones that are familiar, the ones that are humorous, and the ones with a happy ending. \u201cCrimes of the Heart\u201d falls into this pleasing category, but any self-respecting theatre company will take it further and deeper. Such is the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11490,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","_pvb_checkbox_block_on_post":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[68,4,53],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-11488","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-calendar-2","8":"category-entertainment","9":"category-calendar-feature"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11488","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11488"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11488\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11488"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11488"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11488"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}