Culture & Entertainment Notebook: River City Players' show 'runs the whole gamut of emotion and feelings'

Those who have attended a 20-year high school reunion will undoubtedly relate to River City's Players' presentation of the lighthearted, adult comedy "White Lies," which opens this week.

Four ladies -- both friends and foes -- come together 20 years following their high school experience to catch up, laugh and discover how each has changed over time.

Donna St. Sauver who portrays the character Bea said she wants to challenge whoever attends, to see themselves in each of the characters.

"My character is one who is very easy to hate," she said. "But I believe there's a little bit of Bea in all of us."

Sauver said what River City Players does is different from paid acting, "this is Community Theater."

She said the focus is "community" and feels that the most important thing she and the other actors have accomplished over the last few months of rehearsals is creating that community.

"We have a group of women who have bonded. We feel like family now," Sauver said. "And that really is the heart of Community Theater."

Performers must have a passion for it, Claudette Hency said, who portrays the fuddy-duddy yet lovable character, Ruth.

Acting has to be in your gut, your soul and your heart, Hency said, "or you wouldn't do it."

"You become one with who you're playing at that very moment. I look into Bea's eyes, and there's chemistry going there," Hency said. "I can look into Judith's (Tammy Tankersley) eyes and I can look into Pam's eyes. There is communication going on."

Hency said it's a huge time commitment with attending rehearsals and practices and also learning your lines away from the theater, but "there's an excitement" to it.

"There's a journey. None of us knew one another prior to this experience, except I knew Debbie," Hency said. "So, we're all new to one another. There's a lot of trust between the women, the characters and as we develop our character."

Hency said that within each of the actors, "bits and pieces" of the same interests are shared. She said bottom-line, "we all just want to be loved and understood."

The script does include curse words, Sauver said, and conversations about sex, because it is labeled as an adult comedy.

"With the 18-plus that we advertise, that's still parents' discretion," director Debbie Barnhouse said. "Some children are 14 going on 21."

Sauver said within the theater community, it's understood what's allowable on stage and what is allowable in real life.

"That's the excitement of theater," she said. "We can get up on that stage and do stuff that we would never do in real life."

What Barnhouse finds intriguing about the production is the fact that the four characters -- Bea, Ruth, Judith and Pam -- were best friends in college and 20 years later they are "like vinegar and oil."

"That just shows what being apart from somebody for 20 years, how everybody goes on his or her own path. These women make that so obvious," Barnhouse said.

Sauver explained that her character represents her "feared self," or the person "that you're afraid that other people think that you are."

Bea is very haughty, she said, and thinks she is better than everyone else.

"But deep inside, she just wants to be accepted and loved," Sauver said.

She explained that the experience thus far has helped her open up to new friendships; it's allowed her to trust others more and it's also helped tackle the issue of perfectionism. It's taught her to accept herself "as I am with my faults" and knowing that its OK to rely on other people for support.

Hency was hesitant to reveal how she compares to her character Ruth, but Barnhouse said, "I can answer that because she won't say it. She's got the same huge heart."

Ruth is the peacemaker, Hency added, who wants everybody to be happy and to get along.

The play sums up "all of the facets of every human being," she said.

Hency said her character will go from "being very prim and proper" and afraid she's going to hurt someone's feelings to "where I just let all things break loose, and I say exactly what's on my mind."

"White Lies" "runs the whole gamut of emotion and feelings," according to Hency.

"And it's all done through comedy. This thing remains a comedy the entire time," Barnhouse said.

jhartwig@semissourian.com

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