Photo Caption: Tinka Finley as Miss Maple (center front) with her Ravenswood Manor guests, Laura and Rick Carlyle, played by Tracy Singer and Rich Salvati; Chandler Marlowe played by Phil Hesketh; and Charity Haze played by Jessica Berman.DOVER – Garrison Players, the Dover area’s all-volunteer community theatre group, will open their 2011-12 season with Tim Kelly’s “The Butler Did It,” a delightful comedy that spoofs English mystery plays, but with a decidedly American flavor.
“The Butler Did It” opens on Friday, October 7 and runs through October 22, with Friday and Saturday evening shows at 8 p.m. and Sunday matinees at 3 p.m. at the Garrison Players Arts Center, Route 4 in Rollinsford. Tickets, at $18 for adults and $12 for students, are available online at www.garrisonplayers.org or by calling 603-750-4ART.
Miss Maple, a society dowager, noted for her "imaginative" weekend parties, invites a group of detective writers to eerie Ravenswood Manor on Turkey Island. Played by Tinka Finley, who won the NH Theatre Association’s 2010 award for Best Actress in a comedy or drama for her performance in The Importance of Being Earnest, she instructs the writers to assume the personalities of their favorite fictional characters.
Director Megan Davenport Karas, who grew up in local theatres, graduated from the UNH Theatre Department and has appeared in several Garrison Players productions, says “It is chock full of running gags, puns, melodrama, mistaken identity, as well as many other little winks over the proverbial shoulder to the ‘Golden Age’ of the detective novel. Playwright Tim Kelly nods to the likes of Philip Marlowe and Father Brown, Nick and Nora Charles of The Thin Man fame, Lord Peter Whimsey, Charlie Chan, and even the less known comic book heroine Modesty Blaise. The joy of The Butler Did It is that the storyline is so convoluted and the characters so delightful, that even if you don't catch every reference to the old detective genre, you are inevitably in for an evening of fun, frivolous entertainment.”
The Butler Did It also features Nellie Teeling as Haversham, the mysterious maid. Nellie, a senior at Cocheco Arts and Technology Academy, is, at a young age, a veteran of local theatre, having appeared in Gypsy and A Midsummer Night’s Dream with Oyster River Players, as well as in Garrison Players’ Crimes of the Heart. British ex-pat Emily Steltzer, who played Catherine in The Foreigner last season, plays social secretary Rita Eyelsbarrow. Appearing as the Sam Spade character, Chandler Marlowe, is Phil Hesketh, who was last seen as Bernard in last season’s Don’t Dress for Dinner. Rick and Laura Carlyle, Kelly’s homage to The Thin Man’s Nick and Nora Charles, are played by Rich Salvati and Tracy Singer. The comedy also features Noah Nelsen, a first-time Garrison Player, as Louie Fan, Richard Harris, last seen as Oscar Madison in The Odd Couple, as Father White, and Jessica Lynn Berman, who last appeared in Crimes of the Heart and The Dining Room, as Charity Haze.
With a set designed by local performer, Tim Robinson, and lighting and sound design by Paul Barton and Scott Seely, this show promises to be one of the highlights of the theatre season. The Garrison Players Arts Center is air-conditioned and handicap accessible.
Garrison Players is a nonprofit, volunteer-based community theatre group dedicated to enriching the cultural life of the area by presenting high-quality theatrical performances geared for family audiences. Established in 1953, the players encourage people of all ages to enjoy and participate in the many facets of the performing arts; and to help maintain the Garrison Players Arts Center. For more information about auditions, shows, or the Garrison Players, visit the website at www.garrisonplayers.org.
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