The Elbert Theatre is set to premiere their third show of the 2023 season as "Artifice" comes center stage, full of laughs and a tinge of mystery.
“It’s basically about an artist who’s about to hit it pretty big and he goes off on a trek to the himalayas, gets caught up in an avalanche, they never found the body, so he’s pronounced dead and his estranged wife and best friend who run his art gallery auction off his work, which has been – now that he’s dead there’s no more work so the price goes up – so they’re going to look to make a killing off of it and they have a private showing for the office with some pretty big wigs that are going to come by and turns out he’s not dead, he shows up and that’s not really giving anything away because all of that happens in the first scene. So after that it’s just the hijinks of trying to keep it that ‘Oh yeah this is somebody else.’”
The farcical comedy, debuted on The Elbert Theatre stage starting Friday, Aug. 25 and will continue with a second weekend of performances Friday, Sept. 1 through Sunday, Sept. 3.
The show will feature a cast starring Robert Roach as artist “Payne Showers” and Jennifer White as his wife “Maggie Larue.”
“Robert Roach is 'Payne,' I want to say he’s done some stuff in Hartwell, but he’s definitely done stuff here. He worked back stage on 'Clue,' he was in 'Murder on the Orient Express,' he was actually the dead body and he’s playing the artist that is supposed to be dead this time,” Weiss said. “Jennifer White plays Maggie. She was in 'Murder on the Orient Express,' she was 'Princess Dragomirov,' which was her first show since like college and she’s really talented and she’s even better in this.”
Maggie, who suspects her husband is dead, picks up a boyfriend named “Trent Matlock” who is played by Walt Gaines.
Helping to host the art auction is the bartender “Graciela” played by Sonja Thompson and one of the esteemed guests in attendance is newspaper mogul Judith Fontaine who is played by Amanda Gaines.
Also starring in the play is Shirley Dillard as “Mick Fitzgerald,” Justin Mitchell as “Richard” and Adrianna Watson as “Emma.”
Rebekah Brooks is serving as the assistant director while Emily Word is serving as stage manager. Bob Larson will be in charge of sound.
The set for the play is a “simple” set, which Weiss said means its set in one location, Payne’s farmhouse retreat. The walls are donned with Payne’s work and the set is made to feel like the audience is in the living room with the cast.
“There’s definitely some big laughs in this show, being a farce. One as a cast it’s really fun which is good as a director because you want your cast to have fun because that makes it easier,” Weiss said. “I think if the cast is having a lot of fun the audience will pick up on the energy and the atmosphere. The biggest thing I hope they take away from it is laughter, but the second thing is I hope they want to get involved with the community. It takes a lot of people to make these shows happen and I don’t know if people realize this or not, but this is all volunteer work. People are here three or four nights a week for several hours volunteering their time after their normal jobs. It takes a lot of people to put them on and we’re always welcoming new people.”