ON GOLDEN POND

February/March, 2013

The Salisbury Community Players are presenting On Golden Pond. It is directed by Rusty Mumford. Show dates are 2/22, 23, 28, and 3/1 & 2.

On Golden Pond is the love story of Ethel and Norman Thayer, who are returning to their summer home on Golden Pond for the forty-eighth year. He is a retired professor with heart palpitations and a failing memory—but still as tart-tongued, observant and eager for life as ever. Ethel, the perfect foil for Norman, delights in all the small things that have enriched and continue to enrich their long life together. They are visited by their divorced daughter and her dentist fiancé, who then go off to Europe, leaving his teenage son behind for the summer. The boy quickly becomes the "grandchild" the elderly couple have longed for, and as Norman revels in taking his ward fishing and thrusting good books at him, he also learns some lessons about modern teenage awareness—and slang—in return. In the end, as the summer wanes, so does their brief utopia, and in the final, deeply moving moments of the play, Norman and Ethel are brought even closer together by the occurrence of a mild heart attack. Time, they know, is now against them, but the years have been good and, perhaps, another summer on Golden Pond still awaits.

Sat, Feb 24 Lyd and I attended the matinee performance. The cast did a good job and the 2/3 full house laughed a lot. The set was completed in a day with a nice mural of the pond, painted by Judy, visible through the windows. Thu, Nov 15 Rusty has announced auditions on Dec 2, 3, & 4. Whereas we'll be on the Mississippi in early March, I'll not be auditioning.