The New Year gets off to a great start at RVP with the romantic comedy Impressionism by Michael Jacobs and directed by Billie Cox. Impressionism raises the question: Does art imitate life, or does life imitate art?
The playwright, Michael Jacobs has written for Broadway and television. For many years, Director Billie Cox has been a director, playwright, composer, lyricist, and sound designer.
The setting by Malcolm Rodgers is a small art gallery of Katharine Keenan (Mary Ann Rodgers) where Thomas Buckle (Tom Reilly) has been employed for the past two years. Thomas brings Katharine coffee each morning and tells her his stories. These stories lead to flashbacks that have led to the present state as well as a relationship to the art that hangs in the gallery. Both people use the gallery as a “hiding place” to separate themselves from a world which has wounded them – Thomas, by his time as a world-traveling photojournalist, and Katharine, by many failed relationships.
In Impressionism, we’re informed by artwork wonderfully projected onto the gallery’s rear wall. Katharine can’t bring herself to sell her merchandise, and Thomas is a photographer who seems to be suffering from the photographer’s version of “writer’s block.”
In the end, the audience is taken on a journey through which a love story shows Katharine and Thomas, that, just like the impressionist art on the walls, the more they step away from the canvas of their lives up to now, the more they realize their future together might hold more depth than the past that has led them to each other.
The two lead actors – Tom Reilly and Mary Ann Rodgers – give professional performances. They’re supported by an outstanding cast, including Ellen Brooks, as Julia Davidson; Phillip Percy Williams as Chiambuane, and also as Mr. Linder; Dale Camden as Douglas Finch; James Montellato as Ben Joplin; Alana Samuels as Nicole Halladay; and Elena Gnatek (Juliana Postrel and also alternating as young Katharine).
Impressionism is a gentle romantic comedy which weaves a spell that will remain with you long after you’ve seen the show.
Impressionism runs January 16 through February 15, 2015, with performances on Thursdays at 7:30pm; Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00pm; and Sundays at 2:00pm.
Please note there will be no matinee performance on Super Bowl Sunday, February 1st, and there will be two performances on February 14th: at 2:00pm and 8:00pm.
All performances take place at the Barn Theatre, home of the Ross Valley Players, 30 Sir Francis Drake Blvd. in Ross CA. To order tickets, telephone 415-456-9555 ext. 1, or visit www.rossvalleyplayers.com
Coming up next at Ross Valley Players is A Month in the Country, a tragi-comedy adapted by Brian Friel from Turgenev, from March 13 through April 12, 2015.
Flora Lynn Isaacson
