By STU CLAMPITT
news@readthereporter.com
Main Street Productions is staging a heartwarming and thought-provoking play, The Curious Savage, for two weeks at Basile Westfield Playhouse, 220 N. Union St. It is a story that asks the audience to see themselves and people in their lives in the characters on stage, and it explores the question of whether being well-adjusted to society truly makes you a better person or not.
The Reporter spoke with Director Nancy Lafferty about the play itself and about her lifetime of experience with the main character, Mrs. Ethel P. Savage.
The residents of The Cloisters look at a picture of Lily Belle in the newspaper with Mrs. Savage. (From left) Jennifer Poynter as Florence, Tanya Haas as Mrs. Savage, Phoebe Aldridge as Fairy May, Lisa Warner as Mrs. Paddy, Josh Rooks as Jeffery and Thom Johnson as Hannibal. (Photo provided by Main Street Productions)
“The Curious Savage is about a woman who has been recently widowed from a very wealthy man,” Lafferty told The Reporter. “Mrs. Savage is a little bit of a free spirit, and she decides she wants to take her husband’s money and, instead of using it for herself and for her stepchildren, who are all adults, she wants to make a memorial fund to help people who are pursuing their dreams. Those people would be labeled foolish by many standards, but to Mrs. Savage they are deserving of her money.”
Mrs. Savage’s three stepchildren, a senator, a judge, and a woman who likes to spend money, are very unhappy that their stepmother is giving away “their” money. They commit her to an institution called The Cloisters.
The play takes place in the living room of the Cloisters where Mrs. Savage meets a doctor, a nurse and five residents of the Cloisters.
“The residents are very much like her,” Lafferty said. “They are broken. They have been sent there for a variety of reasons. And, of course, they are the most beautiful people Mrs. Savage has ever met. They become her new family.”
Mrs. Savage’s stepchildren question her on where she has hidden their father’s money. Mrs. Savage cannot answer because she has a headache. (From left) Tanya Haas as Mrs. Savage, Steven Marsh as Titus, Jan Borcherding as Lily Belle, and Ian A. Montgomery as Samuel. (Photo provided by Main Street Productions)
According to Lafferty, the story is about the question of who the good people are and who are the “crazy” ones.
“Of course, while we would think the Savage children (no pun intended) would appear to be the sane people because they are the functional people on the outside, yet of course they are the savages,” Lafferty said.
Lafferty calls Mrs. Savage a delightful, cherubic, smiling, happy, well-adjusted woman who walks the line between her legal family and her new family in The Cloisters.
Mrs. Savage carries a stuffed bear with her throughout the play, which is why the logo has the teddy bear on it. The bear has great meaning for the story in ways our readers will have to discover by seeing the show.
Lafferty has been exploring the character of Mrs. Savage for more than five decades.
“When I was 17 years old in 1968, I played Mrs. Savage in high school,” Lafferty said. “It was the second play I had ever been in. It was unbelievably meaningful to me even as a young 17-year-old. It is a solid chestnut in the American theater repertoire. It is often done by high school, but it is often also done by community theaters because it is such a beautiful story with one of the most beautiful endings on the American stage.”
When Lafferty became a high school theater director in Florida, she directed the show for the first time.
“Fast forward to 1997, when I moved to Indiana, I became a little bit aware of a place called the Belfry Theatre,” Lafferty said. “In 2004, the Belfry did an audition call for The Curious Savage. I went, I auditioned, and I became Mrs. Ethel P. Savage again.”
And now she is directing it for community theater, rather than as a high school production.
“Somebody asked me once, ‘Will you over-direct Mrs. Savage because you have played the role?’” Lafferty told The Reporter. “I don’t think I have. I have checked with the actress who is playing Mrs. Savage and I’ve said, ‘I’ve stayed out of your way and I’ve let you develop your Mrs. Savage because you are a very different Mrs. Savage than I am.’ But she has the characteristics that were needed. She had to have an easy smile. She had to have a knowledge of human beings that would allow her to wrap around someone’s pain and brokenness, and also give her the diplomacy and the directness to speak to her adult children. Tanya Haas has done that beautifully. She is a beautiful Mrs. Savage.”
Lafferty says audiences will see themselves in some character. They will see their friends. They will see their spouses. They will see people who drive them crazy. They will see people who they adore on the stage.
“Post-pandemic, post the darkness, nobody wants to be sad,” Lafferty said. “People want to see comedies. People want to see heartwarming stories. This is a heartwarming story.”
Go to westfieldplayhouse.org/showstickets or call (317) 402-3341 for tickets.