MORAN — Marmaton Valley High School brings a little sass (and a lot of humor) to the stage Friday and Saturday.
“The Hallelujah Girls,” stars an ensemble of young starlets quick with a hug, and quicker with a quip and a healthy dose of Southern hospitality — and hilarity. (Just think of “The Golden Girls” meets “Steel Magnolias.”)
“The Hallelujah Girls” takes place in the fictional town of Eden Falls, Ga., where a group of five aging beauties gather after the sudden death of an old friend.
Each yearns for something better in life, even if they’re not exactly certain how to do so.
Enter their ringleader, Sugar Lee Thompkins, who has decided to pour her life savings into converting an abandoned church into a day spa. Carissa Mattox portrays the firebrand Sugar Lee. She’s used up her life savings to realize her dream. But can she make it work?
Of course, she relies on the support of her gal pals, Mavis, Carlene, Nita and Crystal.
Alexis Elam shines as Carlene, a three-time widower, and the most level-headed and dry-witted of the group.
Mallory Heim is the delectable Nita Mooney, an excitable lass, whose son has run afoul of the law a few too many times.
Mavis Flowers, portrayed by the memorable Autumn Simpson, has her own issues, stemming from a stale marriage.
Last, but certainly not least, is Bailey LaRue as the sweet, simple (and mellifluous) Crystal Hart, who amuses her friends, and the spa’s occasional customers, with an insistence to celebrate every holiday as if it’s Christmas, with carols to boot.
But what’s a play – even a comedy — without some tension.
Of course, someone as feisty as Sugar Lee is bound to have a lifelong rival, none other than the fiendish Bunny Sutherland, played with the perfect touch of Southern inhospitality by Kendall Scharff. See, Bunny has plans of her own for the old church, should the spa fail.
Bunny has offered to arrange things for a local contractor to assist with renovating the old church. Of course, the contractor happens to be the same Bobby Dwayne Dillahunt whose engagement to Sugar Lee 30 years prior went up in flames.
Not to be lost among the female leads are the two males, Ian Bostick as the aforementioned Bobby Dwayne, who still harbors feelings for his former fiancee, and Jeff Spillman as Porter Padgett, a local lovable mama’s boy. Each holds his own with the spunky gals on stage.
Can Sugar Lee keep things afloat with her old beau in charge of getting Spa-Dee-Dah into shape? Or will Bunny’s cunning plot torpedo the quintet’s hopes and dreams?
