GREENE – Question: “And why did you shoot your husband?”
Answer: I just didn’t like his looks, that’s all . . . and I don’t much like yours either.”
Thus begins one day in the manic lives of three southern sisters - one repressed, one irrepressible, and one suffering from being caught smack in the middle.
The only play to ever win the Pulitzer Prize before opening on Broadway (1981), “Crimes of the Heart” is a comedy laced with homespun humor that takes shots at the heart of Southern traditions, as it offers an illuminating, poignant look at family relationships. It opens Friday at the Chenango River Theatre in Greene.
Besides winning the Pulitzer, “Crimes” received the NY Drama Critics Circle Award for Best American Play, as well as 4 Tony Award Nominations and 3 Drama Desk Award Nominations.
It is an astonishing first play, initially presented by the Actors Theatre of Louisville, then Off-Broadway, and then on Broadway, where it established the author as a major voice in theatre. Warm-hearted, irreverent, zany and brilliantly imaginative, the play teems with humanity and humor as it examines the plight of three young Mississippi sisters betrayed by their passions. Author Beth Henley succeeds in keeping the audience in stitches throughout, using the blackest of humor to illuminate the sisters’ struggles, their rivalries and ultimately their bonds.
It’s the oldest sister’s 30th birthday. Lenny is on her way to becoming a spinster - she’s the one still living at home, now taking care of Old Granddaddy, who’s in the hospital with “all those blood vessels popping in his brain”. Her youngest sister, the dim-witted, adorable Babe, just shot her husband in the stomach and is getting bailed out of jail. She doesn’t want to explain why she shot her high-society husband to anyone, least of all to Barnett, the bright young lawyer they’ve hired to defend her, who also has a long-standing crush on her. It turns out her husband, Zach, had been abusing her, but Babe has also been having an affair, and there are photos documenting the infidelity (and a surprising shock).
There's more to this story! You're only seeing 52% of the story. 
Be the first to comment on this story.
powered by 
