“The Sugar Bean Sisters”: This Southern Gothic comedy presents some of the wildest characters and wackiest one-liners that you’ll get the pleasure to hear in a community theater production.
There are a couple of spinster sisters, one awaiting the return of aliens so she can be abducted.
Then there’s the mysterious bird woman and the strangely bizarre reptile woman, each bringing her own surprising twists to this bizarre story set in a small swamp town in Florida.
Its bizareness is deliciously mixed in with romance and murder.
The plot focuses on the spinsters, the Nettle sisters, who are determined not to be spinsters anymore. Willie Mae is going to find herself a good Mormon husband, while Faye is hoping to hop a spaceship.
These two sisters are introduced to the audience after having returned to their less-than-fancy swamp dwelling in Sugar Bean, Fla.
The sisters have suffered a rather disastrous trip to Disney World, where Willie lost her prized Eva Gabor wig on Space Mountain. Willie is bald, according to information about the production.
Willie is so distraught that she unleashes this line: “You can roll a dog turd in powdered sugar but that still don’t make it no wedding cookie … I’m a bald dog turd trying to be a wedding cookie.”
Though trying to recover from this traumatic trip, the sisters, Faye in particular, prepare for the arrival of the space people who Faye believes had arrived once before 25 years earlier in their daddy’s sugarcane field.
There is in fact a disturbance in the sugarcane field that lures the sisters outside to investigate but instead of space people, a strange birdlike woman suddenly appears out of Buster Swamp, setting in motion a chain of crazy events.
At this point in the show, lies unravel and truths are revealed as the Sugar Bean Sisters hatch a plot to ensure the space people’s return, according to press material about the show.
The show is directed by local talent Eric Lewis and stars Phoenix favorite Melanie Calderwood, accompanied on stage by Susan Connors, Austin Gregory, Laura Hanson and Christine Mosere.
The play is written by Nathan Sanders who, according to his biography, received the Oppenheimer Award nomination from Newsday for the “most impressive debut of a new American playwright” for this Off-Broadway production.
“The Sugar Bean Sisters” opens at 8 p.m. Aug. 31 at the Phoenix Theatre, 9673 Firdale Ave., Edmonds. Shows are 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sundays through Sept. 23.
Tickets are $18.50 and $15.50.
Call 206-533-2000 or go to www.phoenixtheatreedmonds.com/.
Theresa Goffredo: 425-339-3424; goffredo@heraldnet.com.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
