Entertainment
I do not agree with what you have to say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it.” - Voltaire
11
A Review of Raney
Melissa Whittaker
The Saint Andrews Highland
Players opened their fall production,
Raney, on November 10*, 2006.
The play ran for four nights
(November 10* 11**', IT* and 18*).
Raney is a play by John Justice
and is from the novel by Clyde
Edgerton. The play is set in rural
North Carolina in the 1970s and is
about A young couple’s marriage
and their differences that they must
work out and live with. Raney is a
southern Baptist and her husband,
Charles, is an Atlanta liberal. The
play has great supporting characters
along with the two leads. Susan
Paschal directed this production
with the assistance of Matthew Peak.
Reid Mosher and Susan Stewart per
forming on stage. Picture courtesy of
Rooney Cojfman
The production started with some
music from Andy Reynolds and
Chance Bell, played on guitar and
banjo. The play opened with Raney,
played by Susan Stewart, and
Charles, played by Reid Mosher, in
their room, getting ready for bed.
I thought this scene was a great
opening, especially with the shiny
red boxers that Charles wears. After
seeing all ofthe Highland productions
that were skits, I personally was glad
to see a non-skit play. The costumes
went very well with each character.
I thought that Kenny Walker, who
played Uncle Nate, looked like a
bouncer with the sunglasses on. The
supporting characters were Aunt
Naomi, played by Mary McDonald;
Mr. Bell, played by Nate Jones; Mrs.
Bell, played by Natasha Grimm;
Dr. Bridges, played by Lydia
Bravard; and Mr. Simmons, played
by David Goodman. The whole
cast worked very nicely together
and played off each other well.
I was happy to see not j ust students in
this play but SAPC staff too. I cannot
forget to mention the wonderful
crew that helped out with the play;
they get everything done behind
the scenes and help with costumes,
props and sets. The play would not
be what is was without these people.
There were a couple of flubbed
lines and after learning in high
school drama club that most times
you should actually speak slightly
slower than you normally talk, in
order to be understood, T thought
that Nate and Susan needed to
slow down just a bit in a couple of
places. Everyone spoke loudly and
could be heard from the back of
the theater. On opening night there
were over 60 people who attended.
Raney dealt with some touchy
subjects such as racism and marriage
and family problems. There was a
powerful scene where Uncle Nate
kills himself. I thought that the cast
handled all of these issues maturely,
as to some people this may be a
hard thing to do. Both Raney and
Charles were people who spoke
theirmind and although they seemed
very different, I felt that they were
quite similar in many ways also. T
thought that Raney made you open
your eyes to the world a little more,
seeing that there are problems no
matter where you live and you have
to find a way to work them out. I
thought this was a superb play put
on by a fantastic group of people
and T applaud their hard work.
Fiction
A Cold Blue Sunday
Sara Messina
Dr. Karras held on to the
other side of the examination room
door with all of her strength. She
screamed for an orderly and after
several minutes ticked into an
eternity, she was forced to accept
the help of Larry ‘Knots’ Stevens,
a patient wandering the halls. Dr.
Karras ran to the central nursing
station to see the seats empty and
several muflled moans and yells
left unchecked. All of them were
from the rooms of patients known
for raising false alarms, so she
concentrated on her task. She
grabbed a dose of sedative before
running back to the disturbed patient.
Mr. Robert Wells was a nice
enough man when he arrived,
nervoxis, but nice. He was a
resident connoisseur of juices and
grabbed attention with a snappy
sense of style. His chameleon eyes
turned blue or green depending on
the shade of his clothes. When his
eyes were a soft hazel, he was calm,
gentle, and caring. But on blue days
he W£is as cruel and vindictive as
his icy stare suggested. Dr. Karras
did everything she could to make
the green days count, and worked
through his therapy session rather
quickly. It was the erratic nature
of his sessions that led her to insist
she be Wells’ first and last person
to contact in case of an emergency.
Today was a blue Sunday, and
Dr. Karras had been roused from
her bed by an ui^ent call from the
head nurse for the night shift. While
doing the early morning medicine
round, a new employee accidentally
gave Mr. Wells the wrong dose of
medication. It started out a very
cold, blue morning. But, when Dr.
Karras arrived, she was in such a
hurry she gave no thought to the
five nurses and orderly that, though
undoubtedly busy handling their
ridiculous number of patients, had
until that morning never failed to
send someone to give her details
on emergency calls. She did find
several patients wandering, trying
to figure out locks on the doors and
elevators. All the while Mr. Wells
pitched a fit, and nearly eveiything
he could lay his hands on was
being pitched across the halls.
“Where is everyone?” Dr.
Karras said between gasping breaths.
“He has given everyone an
awfully hard time,” replied Knots.
Dr. Karras gave an angered
huff as an answer as she struggled
to remove the ropes tied to the
doorknob. She let the door creak
inward slowly and stuck the tip of
her foot through the widening gap.
“Mr. Wells...it’s Dr. Karras.
I’m coming in now, and we need to
have a little chat about this morning.”
She saw the quivering lump
on the couch across the room and
lowered the syringe to her side. The
room was only a ten foot square with
a small couch, an in-the-wall closet,
and an over turned chair being the
only survivors of Mr. Wells’ wrath.
The curtains of the window above
the bed now let in pinpricks of light
through new tears. Dr. Karras heard
whimpering coming from under the
blanket, and righted the chair.
“I just want to talk,”
she said sweetly, but the
whimpering continued.
She put the syringe down on the
chair and opened the curtains above
the bed. She hesitated for a moment
before touching the blankets, but no
fist shot out at her touch. She pulled
back the blankets, and found a guard
dog whimpering through a si it throat.
Dr. Karras could only let out half a
choke as Mr. Wells sprang from his
place in the closet and plunged the
syringe in her throat. His fingernails
cut even lines across her neck as her
legs grew weak. She heard chortled
laughter and locked on crazed
blue irises before she blacked out.
Outside the closet. Knots worked
feverishly to restore his masterpiece
and struggling in locked residences,
the nurses and orderly continued
to scream useless warnings.
story was featured at the
Halloween party in October. **********