“The Cherry Orchard” to be performed as a free staged reading!

May 9, 2013 By
Stone Girls Dreaming

Valley Playhouse is pleased to announce:

  “The Cherry Orchard”by Anton Chekhov

Free Staged Reading on  Thursday, June 18 at 7 pm The Gathering Place

 

Valley Playhouse is pleased to announce that Anton Checkhov comedy/drama, “The Cherry Orchard” will be the third production in our Staged Reading Series.

The play takes place on the grounds of Lyubov Andreyevna Ranevskaya’s estate, somewhere in the provinces of Russia. Lopakhin, a sometime peasant who has become a wealthy businessman, and Dunyasha, the maid, are waiting for Lyubov. She has been away from home a long time, living in Paris with her lover. When she arrives with her daughter, Anya, she is welcomed by her brother, Gayev, and other family, friends, staff and neighbors. Lyubov and Gayev recall happy times from their childhoods on the estate. But unless the family can raise enough money to save it, the estate will have to be sold to clear Lyubov’s debts. They concoct several plans, one of which entails cutting down their famous cherry orchard. But no one plan is settled upon. As August approaches, when the estate must be auctioned off to meet the mortgage payments, what unfolds in this household is a comedy-drama of timeless, bittersweet beauty. THE CHERRY ORCHARD is universally acknowledged as one of the masterpieces of world theatre.

“For a long time after you have seen it, you are likely to believe this must be the most wonderful play in the world.” —NY Times. “…direct and accessible…[Mann] has illuminated her scenes with broad, bittersweet and warmly wry comic moments…” —Variety.                                                                                                                                                                             

This performance is free and open to the public.  It will be performed on Thursday, June 18, 2013 at 7 pm at The Gathering Place, 841 Mt. Clinton Pike, Harrisonburg, VA 22802 behind the Bowl of Good.

 

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The Shakes to perform at “Three Viewings”

March 6, 2012 By

Mark Lane and Dan Easley,  members of the local folk/blues/ragtime  group The Shakes, will be performing live pre-show music for Three Viewings.  (Concerts will start at 7:30 pm Thursdays – Saturdays March 8-10 and March 15 – 17.  There is no additional charge for this concert.)

The Shakes are Mark Lane, Dan Easley, and Crystal Shrewsbury. Blending old time, ragtime, and anytime into their original compositions and covers of popular songs from the 30s through the 80s, The Shakes are based in the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia, where they try to play a wide array of instruments from guitar to mandolin, banjo to upright bass, accordion to kazoo, and bass clarinet to Hammond organ. Their first record, What’s Shakin?, was recorded largely by Mark and Dan in Dan’s garage before Crystal joined the group. As a trio, The Shakes began performing live. An April 2008 WXJM-FM was recorded and released as The Shakes Live. Playwright and friend of the group, Michael Trocchia, approached The Shakes in the fall of 2008 about writing and recording music for his upcoming play, The Blue Hotel, a stage adaptation of a Stephen Crane short story. The Shakes ran with the project, writing and recording a full-length album inspired both by Crane’s original story and Trocchia’s adaptation in 2009.

 

 

 Three Viewings will be performed on Thursdays – Saturdays, March 8- 10,  2012 – March 15 – 17, 2012 at 8 pm and Sundays March 11 and March 18 at 3 pm .  Tickets are $12, $10 for seniors and groups of 10 or more.  Tickets are available at the Court Square Theater Box Office and at the door.  

Live music by The Shakes will be presented for a half hour preceding each performance Thursdays – Saturdays.
An art exhibit by 4 local artist on “Life and Death” will also be featured during the run of the show.

 
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Art Exhibit to accompany “Three Viewings”

February 21, 2012 By
blue-balloon1-Rhodars Playhouse

Valley Playhouse is pleased to announce that an exhibit of local artists on “Life and Death” will accompany our production of Three Viewings at Court Square Theater this March 8-18, 2012. The featured artists include Rhoda Miller, Jason Anderson, Paul Somers, and Erin Kling.

Rhoda Miller

Rhoda has been making art for as long as she can remember and enjoys all types of creating.  She loves learning new art mediums and has yet to find one that bores her.  She loves texture and tries to incorporate it into much of her work.  During the week, she is the the outreach coordinator at the Collins Center, working mostly with adult female victims of sexual violence.  She is able to incorporate art into a lot of her work, by doing graphic design, maintaining the center’s website and co-leading art therapy support groups.  Rhoda sells her artwork at the Frame Factory and Gallery in Harrisonburg, on her Etsy site, and to anyone who contacts her about a custom piece.  Check out her website for more information: www.rhodarts.com
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Coming March 2012!

February 9, 2012 By
three viewings

 

A funeral parlor in a small Midwestern town is the setting for these three darkly funny and  touching short plays. In Tell Tale, we enter the private thoughts of a respectable  mortician, lost in passion for a beautiful real estate broker. In Thief  of Tears, we meet Mac, the attractive daughter of an upper-class WASP family who frequents the  Viper Room and steals jewelry from corpses. And in Thirteen Things about Ed Carpolotti, a newly widowed suburban matron finds her world crashing about her.

Three Viewings first opened at the Illusion Theater in Minnesota in 1994 before it premiered at the Manhatten Theater Club in 1995. It has been performed around the country surprising and delighting audiences ever since. Veteran actors John Michael Schott, Lori Smilowitz, and Nita Gibson are featured as Emil in Tell Tale, Mac in Thief of Tears, and Virginia in Thirteen Things about Ed Carpolotti.

Produced by the Valley Playhouse

Performed at Court Square Theater, 61 Graham Street, Harrisonburg, VA 22801

 Three Viewings will be performed on Thursdays- Saturdays, March 8 – 10, 2012 – March 15 –  17, 2012 at 8 pm and Sundays March 11 and March 18 at 3 pm .  Tickets are $12, $10 for seniors and groups of 10 or more.  Tickets are available at the Court Square Theater Box Office and at the door.  *

Live music by The Shakes will be presented for a half hour preceding each performance Thursdays – Saturdays.
An art exhibit by 4 local artist on “Life and Death” will also be featured during the run of the show.

*Thursday, March 15, 2012 is “Pay What You Will” night.

 

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