Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, March 24, 1995 TAG: 9503240073
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KEVIN KITTREDGE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
"Grace and Glorie."
Not to mention sparks.
"They're cantankerous, both of them," grinned Mill Mountain Theatre Director Jere Lee Hodgin, who is directing the production of "Grace and Glorie" that opens tonight in Mill Mountain's Theatre B. "They kick and scream, and fight the whole play. ... We've been trying to do [the play] for a couple of years, but there's been an off-Broadway option on it."
Indeed, there still is. Mill Mountain Theatre in the end received special permission from the New York City producers of "Grace and Glorie" to perform the play.
Written several years ago by Lexington playwright Tom Ziegler, "Grace and Glorie" has been performed in the past in Virginia and elsewhere under the name of ``Apple Dreams.''
Hodgin, who first encountered the play when judging a play-writing competition in 1990, said he liked it from the start - but the latest version is by far the best.
"I think the focus is much stronger," Hodgin said. "It's a more streamlined play. The characters are more vibrant and more clear.''
Grace is a 90-year-old mountain woman, Gloria a young-ish New York City woman who has recently lost a child. Her drive to succeed swallowed up in her grief, Gloria moves to a Virginia town not unlike Lexington - where she goes to work at a hospice in an effort to invest her life with new meaning.
"It has a kind of a city mouse, country mouse theme," said Ziegler, the playwright. "I tend to make plays that sort of start out as comedy, and as they evolve become more and more serious, without ever losing their comic edge."
Despite the time-worn story line, Ziegler's script is fresh and full of life, Hodgin said.
"It avoids all the sentimental traps," the director said. "Previous productions have played up the sentimentality. I think we're trying to avoid that. ...Tom has written a realistic play, where two cultures collide, two generations collide."
Hodgin called Ziegler's ear for dialogue and language "uncanny."
Ziegler, a native of Chicago, had shied away from writing about the mountains before this, his eighth play. The 53-year-old playwright has written three more since - including "Glory Bound," which will premiere at Lime Kiln Theatre in Lexington this summer.
Ziegler, who has taught at Washington and Lee University since the 1970s,
said he avoided writing an Appalachian play earlier in part because he wasn't comfortable with the speech patterns. He said Grace, his 90-year-old heroine, was inspired partly by his wife, Shirley, whom he met in Rockbridge County.
Does she like the play?
"She cries every time she reads it," Ziegler said. "And she laughs at most of my jokes."
Ziegler said he chucked the original name for the play, ``Apple Dreams,'' at the request of his New York producers. They felt the word "apple" had too many complex associations in New York for the title to be effective.
Ziegler chose his new title, "Grace and Glorie" from a hymn. He also changed the name of his New York City character to Gloria.
"The name becomes an issue in the play" now, Ziegler noted. "Her name is Gloria. Grace keeps calling her Glorie. It pisses her [Gloria] off."
It works both ways.
"Everything about [Gloria] just stresses Grace out," Ziegler said. "Grace just wants to die."
In fact, to Ziegler, death is his play's central theme. By the play's end, "The women come to a sort of acceptance," he said with a smile. "Which is about all any of us can expect."
Under Hodgin's direction, said Ziegler, his characters have revealed a new depth, especially Grace.
Ziegler, meanwhile, is looking ahead to larger venues. "Grace and Glorie" has approximately 80 percent of the backing necessary for an opening in an off-Broadway theater, and is only seeking a large enough theater for its New York City debut, Ziegler said. The half-million dollar production will have to be staged in a theater of close to 300 seats to have a chance of paying for itself, the playwright said.
To be classified as "Broadway," a New York Theater needs 500 seats or more, Ziegler said.
He is awaiting word this week from the 299-seat Lucille Lortel Theater - where "Steel Magnolias" opened - as to whether it will accept his play this spring.
"As close as this is, it could still fall through," said Ziegler of the fragile coalition of talent, money and timing that has brought his play to the brink of a major New York opening. "It's been like walking on eggshells."
Ziegler has had several lower-budget, limited-run performances of his plays in New York - but never an open-ended production with a budget in six figures, he said. The stakes are high: A play in a major New York venue can mean royalties of $5,000 to $6,000 a week for the playwright - not to mention exposure that can lead to performances in other major cities, and of course more royalties, Ziegler said.
He said two movie-making companies, one of them HBO, also have expressed an interest in "Grace and Glorie."
``Grace and Glorie'': Opens tonight through April 2, Theatre B, Mill Mountain Theatre, 20 E. Church Ave., downtown Roanoke. Tickets, $10-$12. 342-5740.
by CNB