KSC Students to Perform Thornton Wilder’s The Matchmaker

From Connie Lester, Redfern: Keene State College students from the Theatre and Dance Department will present The Matchmaker, by Thornton Wilder. Directed by PeggyRae Johnson, the play will be staged Wednesday through Saturday, November 19–22, at 7:30 p.m. at the Redfern Arts Center.

Best known for his play Our Town, Wilder turns to Moliere for inspiration for this fast-paced farce. Set in 1880 during stressful economic times, the storyline is a constant banter between the materialistic versus humanistic views of successful Yonkers merchant Horace Vandergelder and the meddlesome matchmaker Dolly Levi upon Mr. Vandergelder’s decision to take a wife. The plot gets wildly complicated when Vandergelder’s clerks, Cornelius and Barnaby, and two young women in a hat shop inadvertently involve themselves in this rollicking quest for adventure.

In addition to the fourteen KSC students in the cast, Liz Panneton ‘09, is lighting designer, and Gillian Clarke-Moon ‘09 is stage manager. Several Theatre and Dance Department faculty members are involved in the production: Craig Lindsay is technical director, Mary Robarge is costume designer, and Jenny Fulton is set designer. Daniel Patterson, chair of the Theatre and Dance Department, is production manager and is making a cameo appearance as Joe, the Barber. Tickets are available through the box office at 8-2168 or online at http://www.keene.edu/racbp.

Courtesy photo: Cast members of The Matchmaker — (from left) Jaime Pearsons as Mrs. Molloy, Kade Hill as Cornelius Hackl, Allison Relihan as Minnie Fay, and Ethan Selby as Barnaby Tucker (under the table) — perform Wednesday through Saturday, November 19–22, at 7:30 p.m. at the Redfern Arts Center