Thursday,
May 10, 2007
"Over the River and Through the
Woods" Italian American Comedy/Drama by Joe DiPietro
The
ANNOTICO Report
This
sounds like an IDEAL play for the Italian American Community. I'm
surprised I wasn't aware of it previously.
"Over the River and Through the Woods" Italian
American Comedy/Drama
By Clayton Stairs
May 09,
2007
Nick
Cristano is a third-generation Italian-American
living in
When he makes the announcement that he has been offered his dream job in
Beginning this Thursday, the Swamp Fox Players (SFP) will present "Over
the River and Through the Woods" a comedy/drama by Joe DiPietro,
at The Strand Theatre.
Charles
Wells, a veteran with the SFP, is directing. He says that this play, which ran
on Broadway, is one of the "most presented" plays in community
theaters across
"It is an extremely interesting and very entertaining story about the
importance of family," Wells said. "I think people will really enjoy
it because it is just the best play to come down the pike in a long time."
He says that the title, "Over the River and Through the Woods" is
facetious because "the joys of a little girl going to her grandmother's
house are opposite from feelings of the main character."...
He says that this play is about differences in generations.
"It is about the generation of family that would stay close by," Ford
said. "Now, as we move into this new generation, the world seems to be
getting smaller, and we are moving farther away from family."
He adds that the show's premise deals with the question of how much we should
give back to our family which gives us so much.
"What do we owe those people who give us everything? Values, the
opportunity for education and the opportunity to be successful," Ford
said. "We owe it to them to do everything possible to be successful, to
fulfill our dreams."
Renault, who plays one of the grandfathers, ...says
there have been some hurdles to overcome for this show.
"The biggest challenge for me is to have an authentic-sounding Italian
accent," Renault said. "Luckily, I grew up in
"This
is a show that could be successful in any part of the country. It happens to be
about Italian-Americans, but it could just as well be about any
Ethnic-Americans" Renault said. "It is something anyone can enjoy,
even younger kids because there is a message there."
Phillips,
who plays one of the grandmothers, says that she has been able to relate to many of the Italian-American idiosyncrasies because her
first husband was of Italian descent."I am very
familiar with Italian families and lifestyles," Phillips said. "Being
Croatian myself, there are a lot of European ethnicities that are very much the
same. The cultures are very similar."
A lot of the audience are going to
identify with this play because this is the way they were raised,"
Phillips said. "They will laugh, but they?d better bring some tissues because they are going
to cry too."
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