Martha Wilkinson directs a cast of Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre favorites in the upcoming Smoke on the Mountain Homecoming, the latest installment of the Sanders Family trilogy, conceived by Alan Bailey and written by Connie Ray. With Tim Fudge (who directed the last installment - Sanders Family Christmas - during the holiday season) as music director, the show runs July 22-August 28.
As Nashville's summer theater season continues to heat up, anticipation continues to grow for September's First Night Nashville Theatre Honors, the revival of the Music City theater gala that will benefit Reading is Fundamental (RIF) and sponsored by Macy's and BroadwayWorld.com. Set for Sunday, September 19, at Belmont University's Troutt Theatre, First Night 2010 will honor eight individuals for their sustained and continued commitment to theater in Nashville.
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The East Tennessee native has called Nashville home for the past several years, following her graduation from nearby Middle Tennessee State University, and earlier this season she won great critical acclaim (which means I absolutely raved about her performance) in GroundWorks Theatre's production of Neil LaBute's Fat Pig, a show perfectly tailored for her talents. And I wasn't the only person - or critic, for that matter - to be totally enraptured by her courageously drawn portrayal of the play's plus-sized heroine Helen. After her appearances as the matriarch in A Sanders Family Christmas at Chaffin's Backstage at the Barn, the role of Helen gave Amanda Lamb the opportunity to show another side of her immense talent.
Amanda Lamb gives such a stunningly real performance as the heroine in Neil Labute's Fat Pig - now onstage at Nashville's Darkhorse Theatre in a well-paced and sensitively directed production from Paul J. Cook for GroundWorks Theatre - that it's hard not to confuse the actress and her character or to know where one ends and the other begins.
Amanda Lamb, most recently seen in Sanders Family Christmas at Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre, stars as Helen, with Michael Coursey (Fiddler on the Roof and La Traviata in New Orleans) as Tom. Wilhelm Peters (Boiler Room Theatre's Picasso at the Lapin Agile) and Lauren Atkins (Circle Players' Titanic, Nashville Dinner Theatre's Swing) round out the cast. Paul J. Cook (Street Theatre Company's Tuesdays With Morrie) directs.
Amanda Lamb, most recently seen in Sanders Family Christmas at Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre, stars as Helen, with Michael Coursey (Fiddler on the Roof and La Traviata in New Orleans) as Tom. Wilhelm Peters (Boiler Room Theatre's Picasso at the Lapin Agile) and Lauren Atkins (Circle Players' Titanic, Nashville Dinner Theatre's Swing) round out the cast. Paul J. Cook (Street Theatre Company's Tuesdays With Morrie) directs.
In this musical sequel to Smoke on the Mountain, the Sanders family returns to Mount Pleasant, North Carolina, home of the Mount Pleasant Pickle Factory for Christmas Eve in 1941. Reverend Oglethorpe, of the Mount Pleasant Baptist Chruch, has invited them to sing and witness, getting his congregation into the down-home holiday spirit before the boys, including one of the Sanders' own, are shipped off to serve in World War II. The show's score features more than two dozen Christmas carols - many of them vintage hymns - and hilarious yuletide stories from the Sanders family keep the audience laughing, clapping and singing along with some bluegrass Christmas favorites.
Directed by the multi-talented Tim Fudge, who does double duty as music director of the piece, Sanders Family Christmas is an affectionately drawn tribute to simpler times that is sure to evoke memories of home and hearth - and if you're country-born, as am I, you'll find yourself missing family members who are no longer with you. That alone makes the show an ideal pick for this sentimental season of the year, but it's Fudge's direction and the commendable efforts of his very talented cast that make it one of the year's strongest productions.
In this musical sequel to Smoke on the Mountain, the Sanders family returns to Mount Pleasant, North Carolina, home of the Mount Pleasant Pickle Factory for Christmas Eve in 1941. Reverend Oglethorpe, of the Mount Pleasant Baptist Chruch, has invited them to sing and witness, getting his congregation into the down-home holiday spirit before the boys, including one of the Sanders' own, are shipped off to serve in World War II. The show's score features more than two dozen Christmas carols - many of them vintage hymns - and hilarious yuletide stories from the Sanders family keep the audience laughing, clapping and singing along with some bluegrass Christmas favorites.
In this musical sequel to Smoke on the Mountain, the Sanders family returns to Mount Pleasant, North Carolina, home of the Mount Pleasant Pickle Factory for Christmas Eve in 1941. Reverend Oglethorpe, of the Mount Pleasant Baptist Chruch, has invited them to sing and witness, getting his congregation into the down-home holiday spirit before the boys, including one of the Sanders' own, are shipped off to serve in World War II. The show's score features more than two dozen Christmas carols - many of them vintage hymns - and hilarious yuletide stories from the Sanders family keep the audience laughing, clapping and singing along with some bluegrass Christmas favorites.
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