I saw a play here during the summer, "Moon Over Buffalo." I live in the nearby town and used to teach drama. This playhouse is basically a building in the middle of town in the middle of nowhere. I did not find the play very good or well done. Typical light-weight summer stock performed by mostly amateur actors, some seemed exceedingly new to the craft and the younger ones probably fresh from drama school. The audience was filled with many elderly patrons, and some were asleep! Others just looked bored. There were many empty seats. The costumes in the play were atrocious, mismatched, and reeked of what you'd see in a high school production. I did not find the laughs non-stop, instead there were many groan-worthy moments. Phil Rice and Joan Coombs were very good and experienced. Noah Mefford and Caleb John Cushing seemed young and delivered freshmen performances. Of particular bad note was the acting of Alyssa H. Chase. I found her performance extremely weak for such a prominent role; her acting came across as exaggerated, plus heavy-handed and hammy with little finesse, and I felt that she could not hold the weight needed by such an essential character. Every time she came up, I groaned more than laughed. I did manage a few chuckles here and there. But all the gags seemed mostly forced and predictable, and hardly interesting. My husband commented "They must have been desperate this year." Instead of following the rule of "less is more" and "restraint is elegant," the whole production seemed to strive for "more, more, more" which just gave me "less, less, less" as far as true entertainment. Other actors came off a little less amateur and heavy-handed than Chase, while Chase just seemed to want to push everything to the limit until it needlessly broke, and hit you painfully over the head until you got her jokes and bits; though the older performers like Rice seemed to have more experience in control and better commanded the stage. While I wasn't very impressed, there is little to do in the area, so I welcomed the night out with my husband, away from the kids, and the people are extremely friendly. I just wish the performances of the younger actors and production were better. I wonder if I should have taken a nap with the elderly! read more
