Art imitates life imitates art when Theatricum Botanicum artistic directorEllen Geer stars alongside her sister Melora Marshall, daughter Willow Geer and daughter-in-law Abby Craden in an uproarious comedy about a family of actors. Originally written as a thinly disguised parody of the Barrymores,George S. Kaufman andEdna Ferber's winsome spoof about a thespian dynasty is the perfect vehicle for Topanga's first theatrical family. Also in the cast are "defacto" Theatricum family members Alan Blumenfeld, Tim Halligan, Aaron Hendry and Earnestine Phillips, and longtime company member Susan Angelo directs.The Royal Family opens today, June 22 at Theatricum Botanicum in Topanga, the centerpiece of the company's 40th Anniversary Summer Repertory Season.
Meet the Cavendishes, the first family of the American stage, as they sword-fight, swoon and act their way through their daily lives - proving the old axiom that the show, and the family, must go on. Kaufman and Ferber's 1927 vintage comedy is fast-paced, howlingly funny and full of larger than life eccentrics. Three generations of the Cavendish family, all famous actors in their own right, wrestle with their hearts and the pull of two ways of life: secure, dull materialism and domesticity, versus the erratic, egocentric but fulfilling life in the theater. When the youngest Miss Cavendish wants to quit the stage for marital bliss, the family must figure out how to keep her within the theatrical fold.Videos