Town Hall Theatre Presents Two World Premiere Plays

Two brand-new plays by local playwrights will hit the stage for the first time at Middlebury's Town Hall Theater on Friday and Saturday, November 20-21 at 7:30. Directed by Douglas Anderson, they're part of THT's on-going commitment to cultivating new writers and new work.

In Jessie Raymond's hilarious new Play, This is Not a Good Time, a weary mom finds herself home alone for the first time since her kids were born. What begins as a night of solitary relaxation devolves into hilarious mayhem as old friends and new ones crash her house and wreck her evening. Raymond, a humor columnist for the Addison Independent, has written several 10-minute plays for the Town Hall Theater Stage, but this is her first attempt at a full one-act.

"I admit we badgered her into writing this," says THT executive director Douglas Anderson. "For years I've been reading her in the paper, watching her turn the most ordinary events into laugh-out-loud comedy." Anderson felt that Raymond's sensibility was a natural for the stage. "Comedy is hard to pull off, but Jessie's outlook on life is deeply comic." The two met at The Diner for nearly a year, discussing how to shape her vision into a satisfying one-act.

Also on the bill is a new stage version of Middlebury College professor Robert Cohen's short story, The Varieties of Romantic Experience: An Introduction. "It was published several years ago, but it reads like a very funny performance piece," says Anderson. "Translating it to the stage has been easy." In the one-man play, starring Christopher Ross in a tour-de-force performance, the audience becomes a group of students on the first day of class. The professor's lecture on relationships is increasingly dotted with references to his own failed love life. Soon he is revealing far too much of his embarrassing past to the stunned undergraduates.

Robert Cohen is a professor of English and American Literatures at Middlebury College. His books include Amateur Barbarians, Inspired Sleep, The Here and Now, The Organ Builder, and a collection of short stories, The Varieties of Romantic Experience. His awards include a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Whiting Writers Award, a Lila Wallace-Readers Digest Writers Award, a Ribalow Prize, and a Pushcart Prize.

The evening will begin with Jessie Raymond's play, which is suitable for all ages. After an intermission Robert Cohen's play will follows which is not suitable for young teens and children.

The two plays make their world premieres on Friday and Saturday, November 20-21, at 7:30 pm at Middlebury's Town Hall Theater. Tickets are $15 and may be purchased at www.townhalltheater.org, 802 382-9222, at the THT Box Office (Mon-Sat, noon-5 pm), or at the door.

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