Women of a Certain Age

On April 21, 2022 I was sitting in a restaurant with several older women after the Geneva Theatre Guild's performance of Playwrights and Playreadings. (I have learned through the process of writing and rehearsing this show that the term "older women" is much preferred to "old women"). They were complaining that there are very few good roles for women of their age that aren't the old crone, an observation that is entirely true. I had just begun writing (after 45 years of directing theatre) and decided to take on the challenge. The first, second and third drafts of the play were done in about a month and a half and I began to organize the first reading of the play.

 

On June 21st, exactly two months from that fateful day, I gathered eight women (all but two of whom had been in the restaurant that day) on my front porch, for the first reading of the play. It went very well and everyone was thrilled with how funny, touching and accurate it was. The actress reading Mary (Joanne Saracino), who ended up playing the role in the premier performance, cried genuine tears as she read the last monologue. Eleanor Stearns, my producer for more years than I can count, leaned over to me and said, "Steve, you have to let Geneva Theatre Guild do this first." I agreed and the first production was born.

 

The Guild met and agreed to do the play in the fall, which didn't leave much time for preparations. We auditioned the play in the first week of September and I cast Joanne Saracino as Mary, Deb Hodgeman as Nancy, Mary Cook as Sandy, and my lovely wife Cindy Duprey as Ruth. The announcer was originally written as a voiceover, but when I cast Kiefer Schenck, a Rochester-based voice actor in the role, we negotiated the number of times he would need to make the hour drive for rehearsals and he agreed to do the part live. It was a perfect decision and I can no longer imagine the role as a voice-over. 

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Since I was directing the production, it was an interesting time for me. I found myself constantly switching hats from playwright to director and back again. I probably shouldn't have directed my own work, but it was still a baby and too young to leave the nest without me just yet. I'm glad I did because there were MANY changes made. Word changes here and there, monologues added to cover the time it takes for a woman to use the bathroom (we called these "pee-monologues") and even an entire scene added at the start of the second act to help develop the relationship between two characters that seemed missing. I am, of course, ready for this baby to leave the nest now and I'm excited to see what other directors do with it.

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The play opened on October 21st and had four performances. It was very well received by audience and critics alike and won four TANYS (Theatre Association of New York State) awards for the acting ensemble, the director, the playwright and the scenic painter (Robin Parker).