The Garfield Center for the Arts has finished planning for its first full slate of theatrical productions since 2019. The 2022 season will feature two comedies, a thought-provoking and well-timed drama, a big, splashy, family-friendly musical and the return of everyone’s favorite annual short play festival.
Starting off the 2022 season with a bang will be The Play That Goes Wrong, an outrageous comedy by Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer and Henry Shields. The production will be directed by GCA’s Executive Director Steven Arnold. Performances will run weekends from February 11 through February 27, 2022. A smash hit farce and worlwide phenomenon, welcome to opening night of the Cornley University Drama Society’s newest production, “The Murder at Haversham Manor,” where things are quickly going from bad to utterly disastrous. On the surface, this seems to be a 1920s whodunit. But the play is really about the actors attempting to perform it, because in this laugh-a-minute comedy, featuring an unconscious leading lady, a corpse that can’t play dead, falling set pieces and actors who trip over everything (including their lines), absolutely everything that can go wrong in the performance does, indeed, go wrong. The accident-prone thespians will attempt to battle against all odds to make it through to their final curtain call, with hilarious consequences along the way! Part Noises Off, part Monty Python, this Olivier Award–winning comedy is guaranteed to leave audiences in stitches!
Coinciding with Chestertown’s Pride Festival is The Laramie Project, written by Moisés Kaufman and members of the Tectonic Theater Project. The production will be directed by Charles Michael Moore. Performances will run weekends from April 22 through May 8, 2022. The play is a deeply moving portrait of Matthew Shepard, Laramie, Wyoming and a terrible crime that made an indelible mark on the American psyche. Playwright Moisés Kaufman and fellow members of the Tectonic Theater Project made six trips to Laramie over the course of a year and a half, in the aftermath of Shepard’s beating and during the trial of the two young men accused of killing Shepard. They conducted more than 200 interviews with the people of the town, and the result is a breathtaking collage that explores the depths to which humanity can sink and the heights of compassion of which we are capable.
Everyone’s favorite cherished theatre tradition, Short Attention Span Theatre, continues with weekend performances from June 24 through July 10, 2022. Frequently featuring new works by local playwrights, SAST is the Eastern Shore’s premiere short play festival featuring eight ten-minute plays that never fail to entertain our audience while promising to hold their attention for “Just. Long. Enough.”
In September, the GCA will present the Broadway comedy hit The Good Doctor. Written by Neil Simon and directed by Bonnie Hill, it is a funny and clever marriage between Simon’s snappy dialogue and the sometimes outrageous, sometimes wistful, often ironic works of Anton Chekhov. The stories are droll, the portraits affectionate, the humor infectious, and the fun unending. In one sketch, a government clerk over-apologizes and has a nervous breakdown after accidentally sneezing on a general during a night out at the opera. In another sketch, a crafty seducer goes to work on a wedded woman, only to realize that the woman has been in command from the first overture. And then there’s the visit to the chair of a frighteningly overzealous Dentist. And let us not forget the classic tale of a man who offers to drown himself for three rubles. It’s a modern take on the essence of Chekov – sometimes absurd, sometimes melancholy, but always incredibly engaging. The Good Doctor runs September 16 through October 2, 2022.
Closing the season in an absolutely spectacular way, GCA’s good friend Jen Friedman will take up the directing mantle as we bring the glory and pageantry of the hit musical Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat to the stage. Written by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber, the show features a smash hit score, which includes the memorable songs Close Every Door and Any Dream Will Do. Told entirely through song with the help of a Narrator, the musical follows preferred son Joseph who, after being sold into slavery by his brothers, ingratiates himself with Egyptian noble Potiphar but ends up in jail after refusing the amorous advances of Potiphar’s wife. While imprisoned, Joseph discovers his ability to interpret dreams, and he soon finds himself in front of the mighty but troubled, Elvis-inspired, Pharaoh. Joseph’s solution to Egypt’s famine elevates him to Pharaoh’s right-hand man and reunites him with his family. This family-friendly event, which will have you singing and tapping your feet long after its final curtain, runs weekends from December 2 through 18, 2022.
Additional information can be found on the Garfield Center for the Arts’ website at www.garfieldcenter.org. Tickets will go on sale starting in January, 2022.
The Dirty Grass Players, Saturday, September 18, Doors: 7:30 p.m.; Show: 8 p.m.
Bria Skonberg, the Canadian trumpet virtuoso and her band played two different sets at the Pavilion on the Friday evening. This meteoric rising star with her golden voice and masterful trumpet playing blew the top off the tent with her highly accomplished entertainment skills and an eclectic program including Cole Porter, the Beatles, Sonny and Cher and her own beautiful soulful and bluesy “So is the Day”. The musicianship of her band was exceptional and special praise should be given to the pianist and keyboard player Mathis Picard the 25 year old Juilliard trained composer, producer and band leader in his own right.
The festival always brings a surprise bonus and the Sunday Tidewater Jazz Brunch was the venue for the really talented Hot Club of Baltimore led by guitarist Michael Harris with bassist Blake Meister and guitarist Connor Holdridge who performed some up tempo numbers also featuring a medley of Django Reinhardt tunes including “Limehouse Blues”. The music was the perfect complement to the sunshine and the Tidewater’s superb crabcakes and Bloody Marys.
The St. Michaels Art League is sponsoring a free event for kids, “Children’s Art Day” on Saturday, September 18th, 2021, 9am-12pm. The event takes place on the lawn of St. Luke’s United Methodist Church, 304 S. Talbot St., St. Michaels, Md.
Singers 8 and up are invited to join the Young Singers Academy beginning the week of September 20. The Young Singers Academy is a four-week program where participants will receive weekly video lessons and materials via email. These lessons can be used at their convenience and repeated as often as desired. In addition to the four lessons, participants will join in weekly zoom sessions for a group sing. Video lessons will explore vocal production, note reading, rhythm skills, and musicianship through songs and activities. This is a free program offered to all youth in Talbot County. Two sessions will take place this fall, September 20- October 15 and November 8- December 10. Leading the program will be Amy Morgan, Artistic Director of Allegro Academy. To register, please email 
“Picturing Women Inventors” showcases the breakthroughs, motivations, and challenges women encountered while pursuing their goals as inventors. The poster exhibition highlights stories of inventors like Marilyn Hamilton, who after a hang-gliding accident in 1978 left her paralyzed, invented a lightweight wheelchair that was easy to maneuver. Diversity of background and age are showcased including inventor Alexis Lewis, who at 12-years-old in 2011 was inspired to adapt a traditional Native American sled, called a travois, by adding wheels to create a simpler way to transport families and their belongings in Somalia.