STORY AND PHOTOS BY KAREN BOSSICK
In a time when some fear women are going backwards, Wood River High School thespians are staging a play in which women are looking forwards.
Three Victorian women from 1888 travel forward in time into Terra Incognita, a new unexplored land of 1950s music, Burma Shave ads, Marlon Brando and Elvis-like characters, a warning in rear view mirrors that objects may be closer than they appear and something called Cool Whip that they decide tastes like heaven.
It’s all part of Nick Overmyer’s comedy “On the Verge or The Geography of Learning.”
“There are so many things to like about this play,” said Holden Blair, who plays a variety of characters, including Mr. Coffee who helps guide the women as they assess their newfound world. “I especially like how it portrays the women as they seek independence.”
“It’s a look at feminists throughout the ages,” added Aimsley Shearer.
The play opens at 6 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 5, at Wood River High School Performing Arts Theater on Hailey’s Community Campus. Other shows follow at 6 p.m. Thursday, 7 p.m. Friday and 1 p.m. Saturday.
The three women are as different as they can be, but all have in common a desire for independence and a penchant for exploration.
Mary Baltimore tends to focus on the mating behaviors of the peoples she encounters and is devoted to studying and experiencing the future.
Alexandra Cafuffle is an often-forgetful daydreamer. She plays with new words, trying to find rhymes and alternative meanings, to the exasperation of her comrades. And she’s obsessed with Tibet but inexperienced with the jungles the ladies find themselves in.
Fanny Cranberry is the married one of the bunch. Very conservative and, frankly, uptight, she disapproves of everything she sees in the future as immoral. That includes the music of the 1950s and women’s newfound penchant for wearing trousers.
None of the three give off any semblance of being “the weaker sex” as they bushwhack their way into a world of trolls, yetis and psychics in their search for their place in the world.
“This was a wildly popular play in the mid-1990s when it was first released and I remember seeing it a few times while in college,” said Director Karl Nordstrom. “I always like the language and the concept and have been looking for the cast that could do it for years. I just happened to have that cast this year so we decided to do it. The students were very excited to do something of such heightened language.”
Eva Hatzenbuehler plays Alexandra. The youngest of the three explorers, she’s a bit naïve but very talented when it comes to writing songs and jingles.
“It’s fun to see the women as they try to figure out something like an egg beater—is it a fan or a unicycle?” she said.
“I also like that the play has very dense language,” said Holden. “It has some Victorian language and words like ‘quotidian,’ which means something that’s ordinary or mundane. While I wouldn’t want to use those words every day, I think the words create a bigger image for the audience. They can see more of what’s going on in the characters’ minds.”
While the explorers in the play go from 1888 to 1955, the students in the cast are essentially going backwards into time from 2022 to 1955.
“We’ve learned words like ‘shindig,’ ” said Hatzenbuehler. “And I think it’s been great to learn what happened before us—it’s been fun to discover the music of the 1950s era.”
The cast features Piper Kolb, Aimsley Shearer, Eva Hatzenbuehler, Elena Tamayo, Holden Blair, Asia Angel and Sophia McKnight.
Their crew is made up of Hunter Ervin, Skylar McCord, Jaiman Sharp and Ranger Wynne.
Tickets are $8 for adults, $5 for high school students, seniors and veterans and $3 for middle school students.