Tag Archives: The Runner Stumbles

A Reunion in C-8

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That Championship Season (Studio Players 1977)

A couple of nights ago, my hot date (Janie) and I attended Studio Players’ 10-Minute Play Festival. Studio has been presenting this event for a number of years. They are to be congratulated and thanked. Janie and I have attended for years and watched the festival get better and better. Seven short plays and a packed house made for a rollicking evening.

But as nice as the performance was, for me, the magical moment happened before the opening curtain.

I was perusing the program when I realized I was sitting in the seat (C-8) I habitually inhabited probably a hundred-plus times while waiting in rehearsals for my turn to take the stage myself. I’m a theatre gym rat. In rehearsals, when I’m not on, I watch others work. I’m mesmerized by the process…by seeing and hearing other actors making choices that never occur to me. What vicarious discoveries!

I looked to my left and saw Tim Hull, the busiest actor in town, studying his program. I relived watching Tim prepare backstage for his startling scene opening our performance of “Another Part of the Forest” for On the Verge Theatre. That triggered me to recall others in that show that were key to tonight’s performance; Bob Singleton, Allie Darden, Chris Rose were all remarkable in “Forest” and huge parts of tonight’s effort.

I looked through my program and saw Patrick Lucas’ and Jennifer Roth’s names. Patrick’s rendition of “Sara Lee” and Jen’s “Moonlight Lullaby” were two of my very favorite moments from all the years of University of Kentucky’s “Grand Night for Singing.”

I recalled the final dress rehearsal of Studio’s “The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds” (1979) being interrupted by a large black bird flying through door propped open to beat the heat of the night (the Carriage House was not air-conditioned at that time). It flapped over my head in C-8, strutted and commanded the stage for few minutes, made a few unhelpful suggestions, before wending (rending?) its way back to its warm womb of a Bell Court late summer evening. It was an ominous omen for this first-time director. Later, when I finally saw Hitchcock’s THE BIRDS, I understood Tippi Hedren’s anxiety to the depths of my bones.

In 1983 I watched the best cast of which I never a member rehearse and perform my friend Chuck Pogue’s lovely script; “Whodunit Darling” night after night for about eight weeks. Eric Johnson, Trish Clark, Matt Regan Julie Stevens, Jack Lynch, and David Darst were simply excellent playing their roles, all of which I wanted to be playing myself. They were great…I loved/hated them all.

I first met Paul Thomas and Gene Arkle in Studio’s 1977 production of “The Runner Stumbles.” I have since worked with them in two dozen or so shows. I have been Paul’s theatrical hunting partner, wastrel son, store clerk, employer, gangster toadie, murder suspect, and political crony…all sitting with me tonight in C-8.

Nice night at the theatre…good show…good company.

A Runner Stumbles to 1977

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I had a time-warp moment one night in 2018.

After our matinée performance of Lucas Hnath’s The Christians at AthensWest Theatre, there was a talk-back session with members of the audience. Talk-back sessions are not a thrill for me. They’re usually sparsely attended and fairly short, with a few timid questions and typically one unpredictable pompous answer that serves to evaporate any remaining questions, comments, or conversation.

But this show is atypical.

The innate civility of the script seemed to invite participation. Several dozen audience members lingered each night. People were moved and wanted to share…emphasis on “share”. They had been challenged to listen and think and explore without judgement or solution. They had not been challenged to either change or be considered deficient. There were no instant triggers to defend feelings or questions or beliefs. Curiosity and civility seemed to be in ascendance. Pomposity had left to beat the traffic.

After Sunday’s talk-back concluded, a lady approached me and said; “You probably don’t remember me…”

She was wrong.

Seeing her took me back 31 years.

I played a pastor in The Christians. The last time I played a religious leader was in 1977 at Studio Players. I played an erring priest in The Runner Stumbles. My Sunday questioner was my director for that show. How cool is that?

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The Runner Stumbles (1977)

However, rolling my mind back to 1977 and that show reminded me that I first met two great friends and actors in that production; Gene Arkle and Paul Thomas.

At the first company meeting of The Runner Stumbles, we were polled by our director to give our first impressions of the script. The gentleman to my right replied that the script reminded him of Mahler’s 2nd Symphony. He went on to elaborate, but he had lost me at Mahler. To me at that time, “Mahler” was just a clever rhyme in the song “Here’s to the Ladies Who Lunch” from Sondheim’s Company. I recall my impatience at the irrelevance of his remarks and being more than a little intimidated. The gentleman was Gene Arkle. My impatience was quickly unveiled as the young know-it-all’s folly it was. Gene and I went on to do a bunch of plays together (some of them were pretty good), and because of Gene, I delved into the symphonies of Mr. Mahler (ALL of them were pretty good – go figure).

During the first blocking rehearsal of Runner, I was sitting in a scene awaiting my church superior, played by an actor I had never met; Paul Thomas. He entered and intoned; “Father Rivard, it has come to our attention…” That’s as far as he got. My guffaw brought him to a halt.

I said he “intoned.”

Actually it sounded more like a cross between Gabby Hayes and a soupçon of Ethel Merman, with maybe a smidgen of dentist’s drill thrown in.

I truly thought it was a rehearsal gag. I was ashamed when I was discovered my error and have spent the ensuing 30+ years trying to make it up to my gifted friend. Paul and I have performed together about two dozen times and I was his best man when he and Lisa wed.

All of this flooded my mind when my Sunday lady prompted; “You probably don’t remember me…”

How wrong can a person be?

Moments of origin can’t be forgotten…certainly not by actors. We remember the people, the time, the place, the temperature, the wind direction, the smell, the sound. We dredge those moments from the past and use them to create today and hope always to launch new moments of origin…that won’t be forgotten.

It’s a powerful reason to get up in the morning…