Timeless love affair graces WCT stage
In a timeless rendition of a lifelong love affair, A.J. Gurney's play “Love Letters” opens Friday, June 10 at Willits Community Theatre for six performances through June 19.
Directed by Kelly Kesey, who starred in the 2014 WCT romantic hit “The Angel of Chatham Square,” the show features three couples performing the love story through the reading of letters sent between Melissa Gardner and Andrew Ladd III from their third grade into their later years.
This unique epistolary form becomes mesmerizing, Kelly says, through the kind of magic that comes from the feelings evoked by the language the awardwinning playwright has wrought between these two pen pals. The letters are not verbose, but perfectly to the point, she says, with some very short, and some only one word—but always effective as Melissa reads hers to Andrew, and he reads his to her. In effect the action unfolds within a timelessness of lasting love and friendship.
Director Kesey says, “You become invested in the lives of Melissa and Andy, as you listen to their precious letters passed between them over the years. In the beginning you are sitting next to them in grade school and then it's off to summer camp, college, career and family. Your past and theirs sweetly and sometimes will bitterly intertwine on this beautiful journey.”
The play has a long history of popularity on Broadway in productions that have featured Colleen Dewhurst and Jason Robards in the roles, Lynn Redgrave and John Clark, Polly Bergen and Robert Vaughn, and Timothy Hutton and Elizabeth Mcgovern — among the many leading stars who have been drawn to performing “Love Letters.”
Starring in the WCT production are the talented Cortlandt Wilson and Earlene Gleisner, real-life married couple Kathy and Aris Vellis, and Kelly Kesey and her husband, Rod Grainger. The couples will take turns performing the shows with Wilson and Gleisner on June 10 and 11, the Vellises on June 17 and 18, and Kesey and Grainger performing the two Sunday matinees June 12 and 19. Showtimes are 7:30 p.m. for Friday and Saturday, 2 p.m. for Sunday.