Almost Maine opens at Mesquite Community Theater

By BOBBIE GREEN

The Progress

The production of Almost Maine by John Cariani opened on Thursday evening, March 21 at the Mesquite Community Theater. If the aim of the Virgin Valley Theatre Group was to give the audience something different, they succeeded.

“It is different” were the very first words of every audience member interviewed by The Progress at the play on Friday night.

Almost Maine is all about feelings of love and relationships portrayed by eight different couples, each of whom the audience views for only a brief moment of time.

This production has “Almost” everything needed to make a great play. The set design was superb the lighting, the moon, the Aurora Borealis; all were impressive.

The actors were all outstanding in their performances. Especially given they had only ten minutes in each segment to portray their characters and touch the audience. The production had excellent casting with actors of all age groups. It was delightful to have local teenagers involved.

Director Robert Craig is to be commended for his ability to draw out the actors’ skills that were displayed in these short segments.

But no matter how good the directing, the acting and the sets, it was hard to overcome a poor script. It was confusing at times and left the audience wondering what the segment was all about and why they were being made privy to it.

Attendee Kathryn Richmond said, “This is different, you must be aware and like the subtleness of it.”
Kelly Arriaza stated “It is very different than most of their plays, it is like a lot of short stories.”
“This play is very different,” said Sandy Sorensen. “Short acts that are a bit difficult to understand. But it was nice to see the young people included.”

Marlyn Selleck expressed her feelings saying “I have had experiences in Maine, but they sure were not like this.”
If you are a person who wants to see a story with a beginning and ending with a few laughs or touching drama in between this type production is probably not your cup of tea.

However, as I stated above, all the cast members did a terrific job portraying their characters. If your friend is on stage, you can enjoy their performance without trying to understand the playwriter.