Big Love

By Charles L. Mee

Directed By Margot Melcon

The Blue Room Theatre is proud to present Big Love by Charles L. Mee starting February 13 and running every Thursday, Friday and Saturday evening through March 1. Just in time for Valentine's Day!

Big Love is an hysterical and theatrical reinvention of the battle of the sexes, with an astonishing victory in the end!

Fifty brides, all sisters, flee from Greece in a desperate attempt to escape their arranged marriages to their fifty cousins, all brothers. Upon leaving Greece, they stumble into a private villa on the Italian coast thinking it a hotel where they might seek refuge. The sisters, represented by the hopelessly romantic Lydia (Jocelyn Stringer), pampered princess Olympia (JessLeanne Perry), and combative, strong-willed Thyona (Michelle Smith), then plot a way, any way, to get themselves out of marrying the grooms, who are in hot pursuit.

The play see-saws between comedy and tragedy as it is filled with riotous physical humor, a group wedding and a mass murder, and truth about how we find love and fall in love. The grooms, definetly a match for the brides, have just returned from seeking their fortune in America expecting to get hitched. Tough-talking Constantine (Slim Barkowska) leads the brothers Oed (Matthew Brown) and Nikos (Jeremy Votava) into negotiations with the owner of the villa, Piero (Paul Stout) who sells out the sisters and orders a giant wedding cake.

Will love truly trump all? One couple, Lydia and the sensitive Nikos, manage to fall in love in the midst of the mayhem and massacre of the wedding day. Lydia presents her new husband only to be put on trial for treason by her sisters for not indulging in the festivities of this particular wedding day.

Rounding out the cast is Piero's nephew, Giuliano (David Clyne) the voice of reason with a collection of Barbie dolls, and a pair of visiting houseguests living "la dolce vita," who can't help but bring the audience to side-splitting laughter. In the end, the focus is on Bella (Sandra Barton), the Italian mother who serves as judge at Lydia's trial, reminding us all that "if we cannot embrace another, what hope do we have of life?"

Big Love will be performed at the Blue Room Theatre February 13 - March 1, every Thursday through Saturday. There will be one Sunday evening performance on February 23. All shows will be at 7:30pm. Tickets are $12 general, $10 students and seniors on Friday and Saturdays; on Thursdays all seats are $6. For more information or to purchase tickets, please call the box office at 895-3749 or purchase tickets online.