February 9, 2005
Delicious entertainment
Old Town Playhouse Crock pot Theater serves up large portion of soups, skits and songs
By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
Rolling quality and quantity into one fun-filled package, Crock pot Theater once again hit all the notes: large portions of great food and huge helpings of great entertainment.
Held Saturday night at the Old Town Playhouse, 106 people gathered in the Studio Theater to eat, laugh, clap and then start all over again, act after act. Attendees brought vast quantities of home made soups and stews. The serving table groaned under an eclectic mix of everything from Spicy Spanish Curry and White Bean Chili to Beer Beef Bone Broth and Chinese New York Minestrone. Bread and dessert rounded out the fare.
Emceed for the second year by Stephanie Mills, an author, speaker and activist based in Maple City, the entertainment was also eclectic. Comedy skits and poignant stories shared the stage with music, poetry and dance numbers.
"This is a jam-packed evening of locally gifted talent," she said during the show, adding later: "Oh, it is such a world of wonder here!"
Many in the audience and on stage are familiar faces in the local theater community. For an evening, people on both sides of the stage lights enjoy seeing their friends and peers in a different way - either acting or singing on stage or just enjoying being entertained.
"Crock pot Theater is fun to see everyone in a different light," said Margaret Anne Slawson, a playhouse veteran who delighted the audience with her rendition of Victor Borgia's classic radio skit "Phonetic Punctuation."
Actors in a production never get to see the whole work, Slawson said, to simply be an audience member taking in the play. The informal setting of Crock pot Theater provides them an opportunity to so. Or they can perform and also get to watch other acts before and after.
"It is so nice to be able to sit back and relax and watch your friends perform and Crock pot Theater is the place it happens most," Slawson added.
Crock pot Theater has been an on-again, off-again event at the playhouse since the mid 1990s. The event has been a regular winter feature for the past four years, usually drawing around 100 attendees for the 20 or so acts.
"It's gotten a little bigger and a little more organized, but the basic theme is the same: sharing an evening of diverse entertainment," said George Beeby, executive director of the Old Town Playhouse. "It's nice, kind of the weekend between our two shows in the winter. Ann Norris did a good job of getting entertainment lined up including a lot of folks who don't get a chance to perform with us because of their busy schedules."
Dancer Mykl Werth of Lake Ann wowed the crowd with a swing dance and an improv modern number. An instructor of dance at Northwestern Michigan College, Werth brought along five student dancers to Crock pot Theater who wound up the first act with an up-tempo jitterbug number. His dancers next wove themselves into shapes and structures during a sensual modern piece.
"The audience was certainly responsive," he said, adding that he enjoyed watching the second act. "The program was well rounded and what I did see I really enjoyed, the last number was just beautiful, a guitarist and a pflugelhorn."
Joani Callighan and her husband, Phil, who met during a production of "Peter Pan," debuted a telemarketing send-up skit. Playing an irate housewife fed up with intrusions, she skewered her husband, the telemarketer, driving him into a frenzy with her faux computerized answering machine.
"I wrote the skit myself after two weeks of moving and calls to the phone company," she said.