THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, April 9, 1996 TAG: 9604090318
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY FRANK ROBERTS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CURRITUCK LENGTH: Short : 46 lines
The curtain was never raised for the Tulls Creek Players last year.
The reason is the one that plagues most local dance schools - no male actors.
The Players did schedule a play for 1995, but no men showed. Stubbornly, the Players forged forward and scheduled another production. No men showed.
They found a solution, and from April 12 to 14 the Tulls Creek Players will present ``Reunion'' - with an all-female cast.
``We had to look for a play featuring women only,'' said the director, Katie Smith, who was named for the late singer, Kate Smith. ``Reunion was the answer.''
A man is the center of the plot, but he is deceased. The play is a sequel to a production never before presented locally, mainly because Tulls Creek knew zilch about it until they got the Reunion script which, fortunately, summarizes play No. 1, ``Funeral Tea.''
Ah-h-h, tea. That's a giveaway. The plays are British.
`` `Reunion' is not as fast-moving as some English plays,'' Smith said.
What slows it down?
``One of the characters slurs and stutters,'' she said. ``She's soused.''
Here is the plot of the one-act, one-set production.
Jacob Starkey has died and his sisters are trying to find a way to scatter his ashes.
``They find a will,'' Smith explains. ``It says he'll leave his money to anyone that will come to his funeral tea after the ashes are scattered.''
The will explains where the money is hidden, but the sloppy lawyer's secretary accidentally blotted that into illegibility.
Sandy DeHart, a Tulls Creek veteran, co-stars with Connie Pippin, Lisa Webster and Miriam George.
Smith, who appeared in ``Beyond the Door'' in 1994, has often worked backstage, and was active with Currituck High School productions. She is a freshman at Elizabeth City State University but, next year, will move her business administration studies to East Carolina University.
``The `Reunion' script,'' Smith said, ``is hilarious.''
See it this weekend. Men are invited. by CNB