The audiences of the two sold-out performances of the Kamsack Players’ annual pre-Christmas dinner theatre last week had much to applaud, and applaud, giggle and laugh they did.
The Players staged Drinking Habits, a two-act comedy by Tom Smith, and as promised, it was a play with accusations, mistaken identities and romance run wild in a “traditional, laugh-out-loud farce” to which the audience responded with standing ovations on both nights.
The tables arranged at the OCC Hall Friday and Saturday were beautifully set with identification posters, little imitation tea lights and nun doll centrepieces. The corner stage allowed good sight-lines for all 170 guests per night, who were eagerly lining up before the doors opened at 6 p.m. Consequently, everyone had plenty of time to mingle, enjoy drinks, buy 50/50 tickets and check out the lottery prizes before the warm bread biscuits and salad were served prior to lights out.
Of course, part of the fun of amateur theatre is seeing someone one works with, is related to, or is otherwise known, take to the stage as a playwright’s character.
And it’s much more fun when a theatre troupe, as is the Kamsack Players, has members who have become accomplished actors, some of whom could feel at ease speaking lines with the best of professional talents.
The play was directed by Jack Koreluik, who was fortunate to have been able to work with eight actors, all veterans of Playhouse productions, and each of whom seems to have been the ideal actor for his or her character.
As Mother Superior, Ellen Amundsen-Case portrayed a woman of authority who appeared to be very much in control of her tiny convent of seamstresses, even though she was blissfully unaware of the financial scam that was being conducted under her nose.
Nicole Larson was a conniving nun who was not above driving a fellow nun to near crazy by whispering ghostly sounds and devising various schemes to allow their wine-making factory to continue operations.
Zennovia Duch was well cast as a slightly simple nun, unable to tell a lie while being enamoured with the way things are done in France, and of course, Kevin Sprong, who in his day job leads the United Church congregation, was excellent in the role of Father Chenille, hiding a big secret from his past while worrying that his job may be in jeopardy.
Beth Dix was totally convincing as a young newspaper reporter who was often more interested in advancing her career than being wooed, and was not above pretending to be a nun in order to get the inside scoop.
Tanya Riabko portrayed a haunted young woman who wasn’t quite a nun and was assumed to have been a spy. She ends up in the arms of the boy of her dreams.
But the stars of the show were James Perry and Adrian Hovrisko.
Accompanying his paramour to the convent, Perry personified madcap and zany as a newspaper reporter who during the course of the play must become a priest, a nun and a cardinal. His gesticulating and mugging for the audience resulted in a lot of the play’s laughter.
Hovrisko, whose acting chops are well known and much appreciated, brought life to a blue-collar groundskeeper who is very familiar with the nuns and eventually finds the love of his life in spite of the inevitable results of having enjoyed the punch bowl much too much. A more convincing and funnier inebriated person would be hard to find.
In addition to steering the actors towards creating a viable theatrical experience for the audience, Koreluik was again in charge of building a set upon which the actors could do their craft.
In charge of costumes, Karen Tourangeau created all the nuns’ habits and priests’ cassocks for the stage and helped Shelley Filipchuk, who was in charge of the banquet preparations, fashion miniature nun dolls to grace the dining tables.
Alanna Smutt was in the back, applying actors’ make-up, while Jerry Paul, a veteran of professional productions at the Globe Theatre and Conexus Art Centre in Regina, where he worked as a stage carpenter, looked after the lights and sound for the dinner theatre.
Sarah Burrows of Kamsack, who operates Full Throttle Event Solutions, was hired to provide the three-course chicken meal, which was served by the actors prior to the curtain’s rise and between the two acts.
Proceeds from the dinner theatre, in addition to supporting the Players’ costs, are to go towards new seating and flooring for the Kamsack Playhouse.
And now we wait for the next production, and if all goes according to custom, another play will be staged at the Playhouse in early summer.
