The Juniper Centre will time warp back to the 1950s for a fundraiser June 12, as the Thompson Playhouse presents Trouble at the Tropicabana, an I Love Lucy spoof and murder mystery based on the beloved 1950s sitcom.
“It’s a funny play,” says Thompson Playhouse president and the play’s director Donna Wilson. “We’ve been rehearsing now for a couple of months. Rehearsals are going great.”
Trouble at the Tropicabana, written by Tony Schwartz and Marylou Ambrose, is set in Lucy and Ricky’s living room and Ricky’s club, and includes Ricky singing, cabana girls dancing, a conga line and mambo lessons.
“There’ll be some singing, dancing, audience participation and good food,” says Wilson, noting that the menu includes turkey dinner with salad and dessert.
The cast includes Angela Wolfe as Lucy, Ryan Barker as Ricky, Kevin Hopton as Fred and Coral Bennett as Ethel, with Delsie Jack playing movie mogul heiress Celia B. DeMilo, Anthony Wake as notorious gangster Mr. Big and Serena Puranen as Ricky’s cousin Rosita. If that’s not enough, prizes will be awarded to audience members who correctly identify the murderer and the motive for the killing that caps off the show.
All proceeds from the dinner theatre performance, being catered by Amanda’s Catering, go to the Juniper Centre, which is currently fundraising to purchase a wheelchair-accessible passenger van for its residential program, with a lift and two wheelchair-accessible seating spaces.
“It’s just going to look like a minivan but modified,” says Juniper Centre executive director Rachel Templeton, and will cost about $65,000 in total. “It might take a couple of fundraisers and a couple of grants.”
While the Juniper Centre contracts the services of the city’s Handivan and there are a couple of wheelchair-accessible taxis in town, those are not always available and a modified minivan would not require a Class 4 licence to drive. And although city buses are wheelchair-accessible, getting to the bus stop in a wheelchair in winter is tough.
“It’s not an easy thing,” says Templeton, and the wheelchair-accessible minivan will make it much easier for people in wheelchairs to get out and about in the evenings and on weekends. “It’s nicer to have a regular van just like everybody else does.”
“I wont’ be happy until we get that van,” says Templeton.
The Juniper Centre is looking for volunteers to help out on the evening of June 12 as well as prizes for silent auctions.
“Hopefully the prizes will start rolling in,” she says.
Tickets for the play are available from Wilson at the Quality Inn & Suites, who says they’re going fast and not many are left.
