Coming August 2012

Past Productions No Responses »

Jun 262012

Messiah on the Frigedaire, Workshop Theater, Columbia, SC

Valley Playhouse proudly presents the Southern romantic comedy

“Messiah on the Frigidaire”

by John Culbertson

directed by Jay Zehr

Thursdays – Saturdays, August 2 -4 and 9 – 11 at 8 pm

Sundays, August 5 and 12 at 3 pm

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

Tickets: $12 for adults, $10 for seniors and groups of 10 or more

Thursday, August 9 is “Pay What You Will” night.

The Story: The small town of Elroy, South Carolina is thrust into the evangelical spotlight, when what seems to be the image of Jesus appears on a refrigerator in a trailer park. The discovery by Lou Ann Hightower, her husband Dwayne, and her best friend Betsy, sets into motion a frenzy of conflict, communion and good old fashioned commerce. When the National Investigator turns the appearance into front page headlines, their trailer park becomes a mecca for miracle seekers, soul searchers and disciples with a decidedly political agenda. At the urging of the towns business leaders, Betsy pretends to get messages from the appliance-based apparition, and the crowds multiply like loaves and fishes. Through the ordeal, the three undergo an evolution in their relationships with each other, and they are forced to come to grips with their lowly status in the caste system of the rural south. In a region where religion is as much a part of life as grits and cotton fields, God surely moves in mysterious ways.

“Harvey” at Sixty

Latest News No Responses »

May 282012

The Valley Playhouse is proud to present Harvey, classic comedy that has been delighting audiences for sixty-eight years. Harvey opened on November 1, 1944 at the 48th Street Theater on Broadway and closed 5 years later. Since 1750, Harvey is the sixth longest running play on Broadway, and remains one of the most popular and successful plays produced by professional and nonprofessional theaters. Mary Coyle Chase received the Pulitzer Prize in Drama for Harvey in 1945.

Mary Chase

Mary Coyle Chase was the only individual from Colorado to win a Pulitzer Prize and she was the fourth woman to receive this prestigious award. She was born Mary Coyle in Denver, Colorado in 1906, the youngest of four children. She spent two years studying at the University of Colorado at Boulder and University of Denver without getting a degree before she started a career in journalism in 1923 at the Denver Times and the Rocky Mountain News. She initially covered the society pages for the Rocky Mountain News, and then became a feature editor. She married fellow journalist Robert Chase in 1928 and left the RMN in 1931 to raise a family and began writing plays.

Mary’s first play Me Third was produced by the Depression-era Works Progress Administration (WPA) and was performed in Denver, Los Angelos, San Francisco, and San Berandino. It was renamed Now You’ve Done It and ran three weeks on Broadway. Her second play Chi House was renamed Sorority House and turned into a film by RKO Pictures in 1939. Her third play was the now-classic Harvey. Mary wrote 14 plays, two children’s novels, and one screen play in addition to working on the Rocky Mountain Times for seven years.

In 1950, Harvey was made into a film starring Jimmy Stewart as Elwood P. Dowd by Universal Studios, and Jimmy Stewart’s performance is considered one of his best. Mary Chase collaborated on the screen play and was paid $1,000,000 for the film rights, a vast sum at the time. Josephine Hull won the Oscar and Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress for the role of Veta Louse Simmons, the role she originated on Broadway. Harvey been ranked 35 out of 100 on the American Film Institutes 100 Years … 100 Laughs. It is ranked in the top 10 of AFI’s film classics and #7 out of 10 among fantasy films.

Harvey the rabbit has become part of cinema and theater lore. Harvey has been referenced in Two and A Half Men: Sleep Tight Puddin’ Pop, The Simpsons: Beyond Blusterdome, The Shawshank Redemption, Field of Dreams, Desk Set, A Beautiful Mind, and Bedtimes for Bongo.

Harvey will run Thursdays – Saturdays, June 7 – 9 and June 14 – 16 at 8 pm and Sundays June 10 and 17 at 3 pm at Court Square Theater. Tickets are $12, $10 for seniors and groups of 10 or more. Thursday, June 14 is “Pay What You Will Night”. On Sunday, June 17 bring your father for free in honor of Father’s Day.

For more information on Harvey and Mary Chase, please see the website There’s Something About Mary.

June 2012

Past Productions No Responses »

May 052012

Valley Playhouse is proud to present the Pulitzer-prize winning comedy

Harvey

by Mary Chase

Thursdays – Saturdays, June 7 – 9 and June 14 – 16 at 8 pm

Sundays June 10 and 17 at 3 pm

*Thursday, June 14 is “Pay What You Will” night

**Sunday, June 17 “Bring your father for free” matinee

at Court Square Theater, 61 Graham Street

Tickets $12/ $10 for seniors and groups of 10 or more. To order tickets: click here.

Harvey was originally produced in 1944 at the 48th Street Theater and was directed by famed actress-turned-directory Antoinette Perry, for whom the Broadway Tony Awards are named. The original production ran 4 years. Actor James Stewart replace Frank Fay as Elwood during the original run. It won the Pulitzer prize for drama in 1945.

THE STORY: When Elwood P. Dowd starts to introduce his imaginary friend, Harvey, a six-and-a-half-foot rabbit, to guests at a society party, his sister, Veta, has seen as much of his eccentric behavior as she can tolerate. She decides to have him committed to a sanitarium to spare her daughter, Myrtle Mae, and their family from future embarrassment. Problems arise, however, when Veta herself is mistakenly assumed to be on the verge of lunacy when she explains to doctors that years of living with Elwood’s hallucination have caused her to see Harvey also! The doctors commit Veta instead of Elwood, but when the truth comes out, the search is on for Elwood and his invisible companion. When he shows up at the sanitarium looking for his lost friend Harvey, it seems that the mild-mannered Elwood’s delusion has had a strange influence on more than one of the doctors. Only at the end does Veta realize that maybe Harvey isn’t so bad after all.

The Shakes to perform at “Three Viewings”

Events No Responses »

Mar 062012

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.