Mixed-up juices
By Casey Gillis on Dec. 27, 2007
Renaissance Theatre director Pam Nowell loves the power that comes with being a director.
Offer up an instruction to the actors — a gesture here, an expression there — and she gets almost immediate results.
Take one recent rehearsal for Renaissance’s latest, “Moonlight and Magnolias,” when Nowell told actor David Zimmerman to push co-star Gentry Farrell off a chaise lounge during a scene.
Nowell went over to demonstrate herself and then watched giddily as the scene came to life. Zimmerman edged Farrell onto the floor. Farrell hit the ground and, a minute later, jumped up with ease, his face looking perfectly annoyed.
“These guys are on stage for almost the entire show,” Nowell said later. “You have to do little things to add variety and flavor without it looking staged.”
Set in 1939, “Moonlight and Magnolias” — which premieres Monday in an already-sold out New Year’s Eve performance — is a comedy that re-imagines the real-life drama surrounding the production of the film “Gone With the Wind.”
The action opens just after movie producer David O. Selznick (played by Jonathan Robertson) has fired the original director and has halted production of the film.
To salvage the movie, Selznick brings in screenwriter Ben Hecht, played by Farrell, to do a rewrite and diva director Victor Fleming, played by Zimmerman, to direct.
There’s just one problem: Hecht has never read the Margaret Mitchell book on which the movie is based.
So Selznick and Fleming act out key scenes from the book, to hilarious effect, and the trio rewrites the script while sequestered in Selznick’s office for five days, with nothing to eat but bananas and peanuts supplied by his executive assistant (Elizabeth Caldwell).
“(Selznick) doesn’t want to disrupt their digestive and creative juices,” Nowell said of their diet. “He says, ‘Don’t you know that digestive and creative juices get mixed up?’”
“If you love ‘Gone With the Wind,’ you’ll love this play,” Nowell added. “(The references about the book) are all very accurate as far as what you see on screen today or when it first came out.
“When I read this script, I was at home in the den, and I was laughing so hard my husband thought I was crying. I laughed until I just about died.”
IF YOU’RE GOING
WHAT: “Moonlight and Magnolias”
WHEN: 8 p.m. Jan. 4, 5, 11, 12, 17, 18 and 19 and 3 p.m. Jan. 13
WHERE: Renaissance Theatre, 1022 Commerce St.
TICKETS: $15 general admission, $13 for seniors and groups of 10 or more and $10 for students
INFO: (434) 845-4427
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