Productions from 2014

It’s A Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play

Playwright- Joe Landry
Holidays 2014

Directed by Keith Gerth
Stage Manager- Becca Holloway

Actors:
Martin Hughes as Jake Laurents
Marshall Kious as Harry “Jazzbo” Heywood
Marisa Lerman as Lana Sherwood
Joseph Page as Freddie Filmore
Stephen Smith as Bud Collyer
Jennifer Vance as Sally Appelwhite

Plot Summary
Oil Lamp Theater invites you to kick off the holiday season with their presentation of Joe Landry’s It’s a Wonderful Life — A Live Radio Play. This heartwarming classic is a show within a show. It’s December 24, 1946 in Studio A at WBFR Radio, and a cast of six actors is preparing to present It’s a Wonderful Life live to the listening audience. With the help of only a sound-effects artist, the ensemble re-enacts the story of George Bailey, a young man whose dreams of traveling the world are thwarted by his sense of responsibility to the family business. Down on his luck, Bailey, compassionate yet disheartened, is at the end of his rope. He questions his purpose in life and considers ending it all. Just then, an angel arrives to show Bailey how the lives of those he loves would be affected if he were not around. The story’s message is profound and remains relevant for today’s audiences.

Turn of the Screw

Playwright- Jeffrey Hatcher (Based on a short story by Henry James)
Halloween 2014

Directed by Keith Gerth
Stage Manager- Becca Holloway

Actors:
Martin Hughes as The Ensemble
Jennifer Vance as The Governess

Plot Summary
A governess battles to defend two children from possession by evil spirits in a lonely manor house, but are the ghosts real or a product of her own fevered imagination? In this critically acclaimed adaptation of the classic Henry James story by playwright and screenwriter Jeffrey Hatcher (Stage Beauty, Three Viewings), two actors bring all of the characters to life. Jennifer Vance plays the eager young governess, determined to protect the children in her care at all costs. Martin Hughes takes on the rest of the characters of the story, from the children’s distant uncle, to the estate’s housekeeper, to the troubled 10-year-old boy.

Dinner With Friends

Playwright- Donald Margulies
Fall 2014

Directed by Josh Johnson
Stage Manager- Becca Holloway

Actors:
Eric Bays as Tom
Laura Coleman as Beth
Chris Miller as Gabe
Megan Skord-Campbell as Karen

Plot Summary
When one of America’s most celebrated playwrights holds a mirror up to modern relationships, are you strong enough to look? This the challenge issued in Donald Margulies’ Pulitzer-winning Dinner with Friends, now at Glenview’s Oil Lamp Theater. Gabe and Karen, a happily married couple, have been friends for decades with Tom and Beth, also married. Everything changes when Beth reveals that Tom has been unfaithful and their marriage is on the verge of imploding. The story is not the divorce, however, but the shockwave effect it has on Gabe and Karen’s relationship. At first they feel forced to pick sides, then they begin to notice the cracks in their own marriage. This “rueful comedy” exposes the insecurities that everyone faces when big changes happen in their lives. The characters are real and relatable: They might be your friends, your family … they might even be you.

Making God Laugh

Playwright- Sean Grennan
Summer 2014

Directed by Brent Stringfield
Stage Manager- Matthew Tepperman
Assistant Director- Mark Cagle

Actors:
Andy Clifton as Bill
Michael Dalberg as Thomas
Beth Goldberg as Ruthie
Marisa Lerman as Maddie
Chris Miller as Richard

Plot Summary
A priest, an actress and a football player walk into a family gathering — and the results are much more entertaining than any one-liner. Making God Laugh centers around a couple of beleaguered empty-nesters as they host their three adult children — a devout priest, an aspiring actress and a former football star — over the course of 30 years of family celebrations. Full of unexpected plot twists and turns, Making God Laugh is a clever, heartwarming spin on the old saying, “If you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans!”

Come Blow Your Horn

Playwright- Neil Simon
Summer 2014

Directed by Keith Gerth
Stage Manager- Michelle Tewksbury

Actors:
Marisa Lerman as Peggy Evans
Chris Lysy as Alan Baker
Amanda Meyer as Connie Dayton
Denise Smolarek as Mrs. Baker
Grant Terzakis as Buddy Baker
Rob Weinstein as Mr. Baker

Plot Summary
Before becoming famous for Broadway hits like Barefoot in the Park, The Odd Couple, Lost in Yonkers and Brighton Beach Memoirs, Neil Simon wrote the swinging ’60s comedy Come Blow Your Horn. Simon’s first Broadway show — and later a film starring Frank Sinatra — Come Blow Your Horn follows Buddy, a 21-year-old virgin who flees the boredom of his parents’ house for the bachelor’s life at his brother Alan’s New York apartment. Alan teaches Buddy to be a ladies’ man, transforming him into a carbon copy of himself. But along the way, Alan starts developing feelings for one of his many girlfriends, and his carefree persona gives way to vulnerability and a desire for connection. As Alan grows out of the role, Buddy takes over as the resident playboy.

Sylvia

Playwright- A.R. Gurney
Spring 2014

Directed by Keith Gerth
Stage Managers- Dustin Peek and Grant Terzakis

Actors:
Eric Bays as Tom/Phyllis/Leslie
Nicola Howard as Kate
Daniella Rukin as Sylvia
Stephen Silver as Greg

Plot Summary
In this romantic comedy by the author of Love Letters, the long-married Greg and Kate adopt a street-smart mutt named Sylvia (played, alas, by a human). But Sylvia soon turns into a bone of contention for the empty-nesters, as Kate feels that she is losing Greg to his adoring new best friend. This imaginative take on a midlife crisis leads to lots of laughs and thoughtful insights on love, marriage, jealousy and canines.

The God Committee

Playwright- Mark St. Germain
Spring 2014

Directed by Keith Gerth
Stage Manager- Angie Miller

Actors:
Kelly Farmer as Dr. Ann Ross
Marshall Kious as Domenick Piero
Mike Maloney as Father Charles Dunbar
Amanda Meyer as Dr. Kierra Banks
June Miller as Nella Larkin
Joe Page as Dr. Alex Gorman
Stephen Smith as Dr. Jack Klee

Plot Summary
A heart has suddenly become available for transplant … and the members of St. Patricks Hospital’s Heart Transplant Selection Committee have only a matter of minutes to decide which of three patients will receive it. With hints of Twelve Angry Men, ER and Grey’s Anatomy, The God Committee provides a dramatic but also amusing glimpse into the machinations of a transplant program, as seven professionals — three doctors, a social worker, a psychiatrist, a nurse and a priest — encounter a conflict of emotions, ethics and responsibilities as they try to select who will live … and who will die.

The Girl in the Freudian Slip

Playwright- William F. Brown
Winter 2014

Directed by Keith Gerth
Stage Manager- Dustin Peek

Actors:
Eric Bays as Dr. Alec Rice
Heidi Katz as Paula Maugham
Spencer Glenn Miller as Mr. Wellman
Daniella Rukin as Barbara Leonard
Cassandra Schiano as Leslie Maugham
Steve Zeal as Dr. Dewey Maugham

Plot Summary
This delightfully crazy comedy from Tony-nominated playwright William F. Brown (The Wiz) delves into the case of a staid East Coast psychiatrist who deals with his forbidden attraction to a nymphomaniac patient by writing a play about it. But all his psychodrama threatens to come spilling out when his teenage daughter discovers the script, and it somehow ends up in the hands of a literary agent — who just happens to be the real woman at the center of his fantasy. It’s a 1960s-style comedy in the spirit of The Dick Van Dyke Show and The Bob Newhart Show, with a nod to Love, American Style.