What do you get when your stage play has to move to the great-out-of-doors, it rains, a cement mixer accents pre-performance run-throughs and you have to replace two actors with very short notice?! Oh, and let’s not forget the Zoom auditions.
You get the Marion Art Center’s production of “Good People,” the Tony Award-winning dark comedy starring south coast actors John Emmett Pearson, Margo Wilson Ruggiero, Susan Sullivan, Mia Vaughn, Paul Victor Walsh and Jacob Sherburne (cross-dressed as a female character, which became necessary when the female actor slated to play the part became ill). Sherburne also directed the production.
The Wanderer caught up with several of the actors and the art center’s director, Jodi Stevens, to get their reactions to the many challenges they faced.
Stevens said that she worked in partnership with the Marion Board of Health and Recreation Department as it became abundantly clear that the production could not be reasonably held inside on the petite stage while providing adequate distancing between audience members. “We were watching what the state requirements were and we had to be careful with the number of people we could have in the outdoor space,” she shared. The outdoor space, Marion’s Bicentennial Park comfortably located across the street from the center, lent itself wonderfully to the event. “The actors and Jacob bent over backward to get this off the ground,” Stevens remarked.
Stevens said the process of selecting performing art productions begins with a committee (MAC members) who research materials and reads scripts. Democracy reigns, the committee members vote and the majority wins.
Stage manager Kaylin Blaney said of the production, which closed on Sunday, August 23, “Everything happened at once,” in terms of having to find two new actors and the technicalities of moving four sets around the grassed parkland. But the payoff, “It brings happiness,” she said.
Susan Sullivan, who played Jean, said that moving outside was a new experience for her. She also shared that her character, like all the characters in the play, is from South Boston. “I’m from New York so I understand the dynamics.”
Margie, played by Margo Wilson Ruggiero, offered her thoughts. “It was an opportunity to stretch. I loved being immersed in the audience.” She also confided that the sheer volume of dialog she had to memorize was daunting. “Theater is an outlet for life; with every role, every play I learn more about people and myself.” Ruggiero will be directing Lorraine Hansberry’s “A Raisin in the Sun” in March 2021 at Your Theatre in New Bedford.
Sherburne added his reactions to everything that had taken place in the production. “My greatest challenge was getting my actors to attack their lines with adequate ferocity.” From the reaction of the audience on the afternoon that The Wanderer attend, his creative directives worked. Of having to step in and play one of the most engaging characters in the play, a senior woman named Dottie, Sherburne said, “It was a dream scenario for an actor-director, to join my actors onstage.” He also had his own personal make-up artist, his wife. Sherburne said that he hopes to lead an ORR Drama Club production in a “…public health-conscious theatrical endeavor one way or another this fall.” During the past school year, Sherburne was a special education teacher at ORR.
But the MAC is so much more than one astounding cultural experience, it is the sum of its many parts, and one of those parts now on view is the Annual Summer Members Show. Opening on August 21 and running through the end of the month, this yearly extravaganza showcases the MAC’s members creative abilities in a wide-ranging variety of mediums. And the number of pieces on display this season brings to mind the historic Paris Salons at the Louvre, where the walls would be covered like wallpaper with paintings. The MAC’s event features 98 pieces in its two galleries and another six on display in the Marion General Store windows.
The works demonstrate the creative abilities of the human mind and its ever-present desire to express itself in ways traditional or surprising.
It wouldn’t be a MAC exhibit without the presence of seashore scenes, scenes of cresting waves, vibrant horizons, tranquil shorelines, marshes, sea birds – the images, some executed en plein air, breathe life into our collective, quarantined souls. There’s Barbara Healy’s oil on canvas Marion Harbor, Janet Smith-Flaherty’s watercolor Marion Water View, and captured images from surrounding locations such as Thomas Geagan’s watercolor Sandy Neck or Jill Law’s pastel Padanaram Marsh.
John Magnan returns with several wood sculptures that take utilitarian concepts to a new level with such works as Mayflower Shovel or, on the second-floor gallery, Day Lily with Fork.
Jennifer Wolf-Web’s Raven, mixed media, brings an evocative moodiness where three-dimensional construction draws the viewer into the very center of a private space of mystery. Nearby Salt Pond Sunset by Alanna Nelson in fiber brings another element of artistic expression, one that incorporates hand-painted fabrics with embroidery and quilting, a trifecta of beauty.
Works from longtime supporters of the MAC, artists in their own right such as Alice Shire, Diana Parsons, Barbara Geagan, Peter Stone, and Sarah Brown, to name just a few, have all contributed to this important exhibit of the visual arts.
Visiting the MAC now more than ever before may be the refreshment needed as we continue to face uncertain times. Making the time to visit the MAC is the gift and self-help you may have been seeking. Seek and ye shall find at the MAC. For gallery hours and other events visit www.marionartcenter.org.
By Marilou Newell