THE FOREIGNER
a comedy by Larry Shue
directed by Elaine Hartel Poritzky
October 2005
The play won two Obie Awards and two Outer Critics Circle Awards as Best New American Play and Best Off-Broadway Production. The foreigner of the title is Charlie Baker (Dick Smith, Ossining), an Englishman who is brought to Betty Meeks’ (Phyllis Kirigin, Croton-on-Hudson) fishing lodge in southern Georgia by his friend Froggy LeSueur (Eric Goche, Pelham), a British demolition expert who occasionally runs training sessions at a nearby Army base. Hilarious intrigue begins as the quirky characters start to spill their darkest secrets. The comedy is replete with mistaken identities, surprising plot twists and evil villains. While Shue’s primary concern is a joyful comic romp, the play is not without substance, addressing as it does the theme of self-realization and serious issues, bigotry chief among them.
Other leading cast members include Jeannine Goche (Pelham) as Catherine, a former debutante, Jim Ormond (Mt. Kisco) as Reverend David Marshall Lee, her betrothed, Rick Apicella (Sloatsburg) as Catherine’s doltish brother and Kevin Vislocky (Washington Township, NJ) as the local redneck property inspector.
Director Elaine Hartel has directed Over the River and Through the Woods and Witness for the Prosecution for YCP TheaterWorks, Painting Churches for Hand-to-Mouth Players as well as Original One-act Play Festival productions. As an actress, she appeared as Linda in Death of a Salesman last season for YCP, in HTMP’s Twelve Angry Jurors, M&M library productions of “Third & Oak: The Laundromat,” “ Breaking in the New Agent,” “ One Naked Woman and a Fully Clothed Man” and in the Chappaqua Drama Group production of Picnic.
Performed: October 22, 23, 28, 29, 30 and November 4 & 5, 2005.
