The curtain goes up tonight (Thursday) on the latest community theatre production by Surrey Little Theatre.
The Clayton Heights theatre group – which because of proximity often includes a number of Langley thespians – presents the dramatic comedy, Wrong Turn at Lungfish.
It’s a play by Garry Marshall and Lowell Ganz, whose backgrounds were, until Wrong Turn, exclusively in film and television comedy. TV shows like Happy Days and movies like City Slickers are among their enormous successes, said SLT’s director Brad Williams.
Peter Ravenswaal is blind, dying, and an ill-mannered intellectual. Anita is young healthy and streetwise. Find out what happens when they meet, said director Brad Williams.
He notes that the same familiar patterns of rhythm and flow in Marshall/Ganz’s comedy dialogue is evident in the play as well.
That of course makes the show comfortable to listen to and easily accessible. But there’s a lot more going on between the laughs: art, music, philosophy, and what-the-heck-is-it-that-makes-us-human, said Williams, who has many years of experience on and off stage in community theatre, as well as broadcasting, film, and television.
This dramatic comedy – with some adult content – takes place in a hospital where blind and bitter college professor Ravenswaal, portrayed by John Nolan, encounters saucy, streetwise Anita, who has volunteered to read to him.
Ashley Chodat, playing the reader, was once part of the youth improv group at SLT.
The clash of intellect and wit between these two characters takes the two from animosity and fear to friendship and understanding, Williams explained.
Both come to their relationship with questions, hers dealing with her station in life and her boyfriend, Dominic, portrayed by Spencer Shearman, making his debut onstage.
Both leave with hopeful answers. Rounding out the cast is the nurse played by Aleisha Fernandes, who is fulfilling a dream of hers to act in a show at SLT.
This show runs Thursdays to Saturdays at 8 p.m. until Nov. 25, with Sunday matinees on Nov. 5, 12, and 19 at 2 p.m.
Tickets are $17 at brownpapertickets.com, through reservations@surreylittletheatre.com, or by calling 604-576-8451.
