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JOHN GOROSKI, playing Harry Baldwin, Michele Shapero, playing Kathleen Trafalgar, and Eric Myers, playing Jumbo Dombroski, sit down at the poker table during a dress rehearsal for “Panache” on Tuesday, April 4. (Aaric Bryan/Daily Inter Lake)
ERIC MYERS, playing Jumbo Dombroski, has a menacing phone conversation during a rehearsal for “Panache” on Tuesday. (Aaric Bryan photos/This Week in the Flathead)
MICHELE SHAPERO, playing Kathleen Trafalgar, shows off a bottle of Perrier water.
JOHN GOROSKI (left) playing Harry Baldwin as Shapero looks on.
STEPHANIE BROST, playing Laura Baldwin, and Brian Zipp, playing Irwin Alcott, talk after going to a dance together.
JOHN GOROSKI plays Harry Baldwin in “Panache.” (Photo courtesy of Bigfork Community Players)
ERIC MYERS, as Jumbo Dombroski, in “Panache.” (Photo courtesy of Bigfork Community Players)
MICHELE SHAPERO plays Kathleen Baldwin in “Panache.” (Photo courtesy of Bigfork Community Players)
There are laughs, as always, in the Bigfork Community Players’ latest production, but, for a change, that’s probably not all.
“Sometimes you see a play and you laugh all the way through it and you get to the end and you wonder — ‘why did I bother?’” David Vale, the show’s director and the president of the Players, said.
“This one, I hope they laugh all the way through it but when they get to the end of it they’ll say, ‘yeah, that had meaning and it was worth my time.’”
Michele Shapero, who plays Kathleen Trafalgar, one of the show’s leads, was a little more tentative about the change from the group’s usual slate of sometimes straightforward comedies.
Especially the first time she read Don Gordon’s script.
“You know, I was a little on the fence about it, I have to admit,” she said. “It was a little darker than what we normally do.”
“I think it’s a very well written story,” Shapero later added. “It will make you laugh, it can make you cry at times, it’s just a good story.
“It’s a good story and I think that they’ll enjoy it and maybe they’ll learn something.”
‘Panache,’ the story of a wealthy, suburban housewife’s (Trafalgar) quest to secure a vanity license plate from a sullen short-order cook named Harry Baldwin (played by John Goroski), opens Friday night at the Bigfork Center for the Performing Arts and will pack four shows in before the end of the weekend.
VALE DID not find the little-known, story so much as the story found him.
“Don Gordon, who is the playwright, he sent me an email about a year ago saying ‘would you like to read my play?’” Vale said. “I hadn’t heard of Don Gordon, I hadn’t heard of the play.”
Despite that, the director was immediately hooked.
“The thing that I like about it is it’s funny but it’s got a heart to it,” he said. “It’s not a farce. We’ve got love, tragedy and humor all wrapped in one.”
The lives of Trafalgar and Baldwin also intertwine with another unsavory character, the somewhat mysterious Jumbo Dombroski.
“We’re not quite sure what’s Jumbo’s background is but he seems to loan money out and expects to be paid back,” Vale said. “I think you’ll find that even though he’s gentle about it you wouldn’t want to cross him.”
To find his Jumbo, Vale tapped a first-time actor, 48-year-old Eric Myers, who’s been on stage plenty in the punk bands Graveyard Girl Scouts and President Frankenstein, but never in the theater.
“I just had an opportunity to audition for this part and I figured I should give it a try,” Myers said. “I’d never even auditioned before.”
Vale viewed Myers as a perfect fit.
“As far as I know, Eric has never broken anybody’s leg over a loan,” he said. “But he gives the impression that he could.”
So far, things on stage have been going smoothly for the first-time actor and second-time director, although there was one piece of Domboski’s character that took a little molding to make fit.
“He has to be big and tough looking and about Eric’s age,” Vale added. “He also had to play cards really well.
“We hit on about two out of three there.”
“The hardest part for me is playing cards because I don’t play cards,” Myers said. “My character, I have to deal blackjack so I had to learn how to do that. I’m a little clumsy with the props.”
MYERS AND the rest of the cast will take the stage for the first time Friday at 7:30 p.m. Additional performances are Saturday at 2 and 7:30 p.m., with a Sunday matinee at 2 p.m.
The play is recommended for teenagers and older and contains “mild adult humor.” Additional cast members are Bryan Zipp (Irwin Alcott) and Stephanie Brost (Laura Baldwin).
‘Panache’ tickets are $15 for adults, $10 for students and seniors, and $5 for children under 12.
Tickets are on sale now at Bigfork Drug, the Pocketstone Café and the Kalispell Grand Hotel, and online at www.bigforkcommunityplayers.com. Tickets will also be sold at the door on the day of the show.
Entertainment editor Andy Viano can be reached at 406-758-4439 or aviano@dailyinterlake.com.
Editor’s note: David Vale is a biweekly guest columnist for This Week in the Flathead. His most recent column can be found on page 3 of this issue.