STAGE TALK by Carol Viescas

Ted Karber returns to directing after a five-year hiatus with the Beth Henley dramedy “Crimes of the Heart” Sept. 3–25 at El Paso Playhouse.
“After five years, I felt it was time to try my hand at being a director again,” Karber said. “My beloved friends (and longtime playhouse supporters) Mike and Carol Bernstein encouraged me to submit a play title to the playhouse for consideration. So I submitted “Crimes of the Heart” to the play-selection committee at the playhouse and was accepted for their current season.”
The play has a long history as a winner. A friend of Henley’s submitted it to the Great American Play Contest at the Actors Theatre of Louisville, and it was named co-winner and performed in February 1979 at the company’s annual Humana Festival of New American Plays. It won the 1981 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 1982 Tony Award for the best play on Broadway.
Karber also brings a long list of success to his effort. With both bachelor’s and master’s degrees in theater from UTEP, Karber founded his own theater, Aardvark Theatre (housed where KIDS-N-CO. is now), which provided the community with outstanding modern and classic theater from 1997 to 2005. He now owns and teaches acting at EPStageBusiness. He also is a recognized playwright. His shows were semifinalists at the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center National Playwrights Conference in 1993 and 2007.
That experience is applied to the complexity of the story.
“I’ve always liked ‘Crimes of the Heart’ and have always felt it is a deceptively powerful script,” Karber said. “The script functions as a comedy but underneath the frivolity of the play there is this incredibly tender and serious story of three sisters who are able to reestablish their relationship with one another. It is a very Chekhovian script, using comedy to teach us a basically tragic lesson.”
“Crimes” tells the story of the three Magrath sisters, Meg, Babe and Lenny, who reunite at Old Granddaddy’s home in Hazlehurst, Miss., after Babe shoots her abusive husband. The stories of their dysfunctional family surface in both amusing and tragic ways as they deal with Babe’s problems.
Karber said that he was excited about his cast.
• Lenny, eldest of the three Magrath sisters, is played by Emily Piperato: “She is quite enchanting to work with. She has great instincts on the stage.”
• Meg Magrath — Sylvia Prieto: “One of my former EPStageBusiness students. It is fun to watch her grow as an actress.”
• Babe Magrath — Alexandra Welch Quarm: “… who has the most exquisite complexion I have ever seen and HUGE energy on stage.”
• Chick Boyle (their cousin) — Megan Gotham: “… who has proved to be riotously funny in rehearsal.”
• Barnette Lloyd (Babe’s lawyer) — Manuel Monreal: “A growing actor. It is fun to watch Manny learn as he prepares for his role.”
• Doc Porter (Meg’s old flame) — Matthew Minnich: “This guy is really wonderful. He has taken a relatively small part and elevated it to a true supporting role.”
The Bernsteins also support him as assistant directors.
Karber relishes turning his talents back to directing.
“As with any production, learning to work with a new group of actors is always a challenge,” Karber said, “and, similarly, allowing the actors to go through their process as they learn to work with me. It is all a big, complicated give-and-take. It is exciting and somewhat scary at times.”
* * *
Another Pulitzer Prize–winning play will be on the boards at El Paso Community College. The EPCC Theatre Ensemble will open their main stage season beginning Sept. 24 at the Transmountain Forum with the 2006 Tony Award– and 2007 Pulitzer Prize–winning play “Rabbit Hole” by David Lindsay-Abaire.
Professor Keith Townsend directs the story, which features the return to the stage of El Paso theater legend Elizabeth Gaidry as Nat, the mother of one of the main characters.
“Gaidry has theater-production credits too numerous to list, but has worked at one time or another with almost every local theater company, past and present, as well as the school districts and the college and UTEP,” Townsend said.
Veronica Sontoyo plays Nat’s daughter, Becca Corbett, and Joel Anguiano is Howie Corbett. Sontoyo is a Colombia University graduate who acted professionally in Mexico City with Teatro de Arena and K-OZ Producciones, while Anguiano is a performance-studies student at EPCC who recently won national honors at the 2010 Phi Rho Pi National Intercollegiate Forensic Competition.
EPCC Performer’s Studio will be doing an encore performance run Sept. 2–4 at the Transmountain Forum of their summer repertory production of “The Fantasticks” to help fund EPCC scholarships.

Carol Viescas is a veteran of
community theater and teaches
journalism at Bel Air High School.

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