Delta’s Sidekick Players are putting on another online performance of a Norm Foster play, this time 2016’s Halfway There.
The show — scheduled for Saturday, May 22 — is the third Foster play the Tsawwassen-based company has produced in as many months, following Outlaw on March 27 and On A First Name Basis on April 24.
“We’ve named this the Sidekick Foster Zoom Fest,” Sidekick Players president and director Carroll Lefebvre in a press release.
“Our first two plays were very successfully attended with over 100 people at each one,” she said. “I have no doubt this one will be just as popular.”
The play is set in Junior’s Diner in the town of Stewiacke, Nova Scotia, whose claim to fame is that it is exactly halfway between the North Pole and the equator. (The town itself now admits that due to more accurate measurements, the town of Alton, N.S., can claim that distinction.) Every day at 4:30 p.m., three women gather at the diner for a Kaffeeklatsch with their friend and waitress Janine (Marcia Strang). Together, Violet (Brenda DeJong), Rita (Carol Jones) and Mary Ellen (Cathy Collis) update each other on their private lives and rake over the town’s gossip.
As Janine says, “There are no secrets in Stewiacke.”
Enter Dr. Sean Merritt (Mark East), a handsome young man recently dumped by his fiancé, who is looking for a new start as he takes over the regular doctor’s practice for a month.
Lefebvre said while at first they may appear to a be simple collection of character types — Rita the vamp, Vi the wiseacre, Mary Ellen the mousy one, Janine the sensible one and Sean the bashful guy — the more the audience gets to know each of them, the more they find how radically the characters’ private lives and thoughts contrast with how we the viewers have labelled them.
“Foster is aware that the face people wear in private is not always the same face they wear in public and, as we discover, some of the jolliest of the characters are concealing the greatest unhappiness,” Lefebvre said.
“Our audiences love [Foster’s] work. His scripts are funny and poignant. There are always a lot of laughs and several life lessons in each one. Halfway There is no exception.”
The Sidekick Players’ production of Halfway There will be presented in “Zoom theatre” on Saturday, May 22 at 7:30 p.m. Admission is free, although donations will be greatly appreciated.
“We’ve not asked for any money at all, but many patrons have enquired how they can pay something, so we’re offering that option with this play,” Lefebvre said.
To attend, register by e-mailing sidekickplayers@outlook.com before May 21st. Donations can be sent by e-transfer to the same address.
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