Enjoy a comedy that's both funny and outrageous and at the same time poignant and touching when The Electric City Playhouse presents the comedy "Dearly Departed," Oct. 1-11.
Dearly Departed, written by David Bottrell and Jessie Jones, takes place in the Baptist backwoods of the Bible Belt with the beleaguered Turpin family proving that living and dying in the South are seldom tidy and always hilarious. Despite their earnest efforts to pull themselves together for their father's funeral, the Turpin's other problems keep overshadowing the solemn occasion: Firstborn Ray-Bud drinks himself silly as the funeral bills mount; Junior, the younger son, is juggling financial ruin, a pack of no-neck monster kids, and a wife who suspects him of infidelity in the family car; their spinster sister, Delightful, copes with death as she does life, by devouring junk food; and all the neighbors add more than two cents. As the situation becomes fraught with mishap, Ray-Bud says to his long-suffering wife, "When I die, don't tell nobody. Just bury me in the backyard and tell everybody I left you." Amidst the chaos, the Turpins turn for comfort to their friends and neighbors, an eccentric community of misfits who just manage to pull together and help each other through their hours of need, and finally, the funeral.
The play will be directed by Pat Shull. Cast members, or Residents of Lula and Timson, somewhere below the Mason-Dixon Line, include:
Bud - Rick Volgelsang
Raynelle - Dona Shiflette
Ray-Bud - Guy Harvley
Lucille - Cara Brown
Junior - Jeff Land
Suzanne - Paula Doolittle
Marguerite - Jane Gray Sullivan
Royce - Jim Leone
Delightful - Tracey Furlong
Reverend B. H. Hooker - Kurt Stutler
Veda - Pat Shull
Norval - Rick Vogelsang
Nadine - Mary Miles Kokotek
Clyde - Rodney Furgeson
Juanita - Kelly Seto
The Joy of Life Singers - Various and Assorted Souls
"Dearly Departed" will be presented at October 1, 2, 3, 8, 9, 10 at 8pm and October 4, 11 at 3pm, at the Electric City Playhouse at 514 N Murray Ave, Anderson, SC. Tickets are $15 for Adults, $13 for Seniors and $8 for Students. A special free dress rehearsal performance for the unemployed will be presented on September 30 at 8pm. Please call the Box Office at (864) 224-4248 if you need tickets or information.
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