This Week - "Camelot," "Purple Sage" and "Our Country's Good"

This week there are three shows taking the stage - all well worth your time!

Opening Friday is Camelot, the beloved musical about King Arthur, Genevere, Sir Lancelot and the knights of the Round Table. This one's of special interest because it stars Mark Baker as Arthur, WSAZ-TV meteorologist Marina Jurica as Genevere, and her husband Todd Preston as Lancelot. Oh, and, uh, I'm in the cast, too (in a thankfully small role), along with about 30 other wonderful and talented performers.

So drop by and see the show - it will be presented by 5th Avenue Theatre April 23, 24, 30 and May 1 at 8 p.m., and April 25 and May 2 at 2:30 p.m. at the Huntington City Hall auditorium.

Also on stage this week is Flaming Guns of the Purple Sage, a comic horror set in the wild west. It will be presented by the Charleston Stage Company April 22-24 at 7:30 p.m. at the Capitol Center Theatre.

The third show out this week starts on Wednesday. Our Country's Good wraps up the latest season for Marshall University's Department of Theatre. The show will be presented April 21 - 24 at 8 p.m. at the Joan C. Edwards Performing Arts Center.

From today's paper, here's a story written by my pal Angela Henderson:

The power of creativity to help find the humanity in the most inhuman of conditions is the powerful theme with which the Marshall University Theatre will close its 2009-2010 season.

Our Country's Good, the Tony Award-winning play by Timberlake Wertenbaker will be performed at 8 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday, April 21-24 at The Playhouse at the Joan C. Edwards Performing Arts Center. Tickets are $20 for adults and $15 for seniors and Marshall faculty. Admission is free to full-time MU students with a valid ID. The play contains strong language and adult themes.

"Good" is a piece of historical fiction based on the journals of Lt. Ralph Clark, a British military officer. Clark was part of a group sent to New South Wales (now Australia) in 1787 to form a new penal colony. To find a suitable diversion for the prisoners and to improve morale in the colony, Clark decides to stage a play with the prisoners as the cast.

Director Jack Cirillo said the play has been challenging for the students participating.

"As is always the case, I'm very proud of our students. They give 110 percent all the time. The subject matter of the play is very challenging as it sometimes reflects man's inhumanity," he said. "There is a hodgepodge of dialect work being done as many of the characters come from a variety of areas of the British Isles. So coupled with the acting work comes a fair amount of dialect work as well."

One of the themes of the play is that theater is a humanizing experience -- an idea with which Cirillo completely agrees.

"Live theatre is communal," he said. "When we watch live theatre there is an interaction between performer and audience member. That interaction is multiplied by how many actors there are on stage and how many people are sitting in the audience. It is a shared experience that is organic. It happens in a moment in time and changes constantly. The entire theatre experience is a magnificent collaborative dance. I can't imagine a more humanizing art form."

Before the play each night at 7 p.m. will be "Coffee and Conversation," with complimentary coffee and chocolate and a presentation by a member of the production's creative team. The event is free to anyone with a ticket to the show.