Dear Friend,
Greetings!
For PBD, the word “greetings” means more than just a salutation. It’s the aptly titled play that launched the company on December 22, 2000.
As we mentioned some weeks ago, one of the ways in which we’re marking our 20th anniversary season is by sharing photos from and/or memories of each season. Today we want to look back at Greetings!, written by Tom Dudzick, one of three plays that comprised the 2000-2001 season: the other two were Painting Churches by Tina Howe, and Wally’s Cafe by Sam Bobrick and Ron Clark. Performances were staged at Palm Beach Atlantic University Auditorium.
This is how Hap Erstein, writing about the production for The Palm Beach Post, began his review of Greetings! “Did you ever hear the one about the Catholic New Yorker [Andy] who brings his atheist Jewish girl friend [Randi] home to Pittsburgh to meet his eccentric family? It sounds like the set-up for a joke or maybe the premise for a theatrical sitcom. But in the mind of playwright Tom Dudzick and the quite capable hands of the debuting Palm Beach Dramaworks Inc., it becomes a springboard for Christmas miracles.”
The miracle is quite literally embodied in the character of Mickey, Andy’s intellectually challenged brother. Able to speak just a few words, like “oh, boy” and “wow,” he not only becomes loquacious when his body is taken over by an angel, but facilitates healing within the family. Mickey was played by Bill Hayes, and Randi was played by Sue Ellen Beryl, one of her few appearances onstage at PBD.
In the final paragraph of his review, Erstein wrote, “Time, the group’s resolve and the crowded landscape vying for theatergoers’ entertainment dollars will tell whether Palm Beach Dramaworks has staying power . . . . If Greetings! is an indication of what it can do, the troupe deserves an audience.”
