For years, BUS STOP has been one of the titles we’ve tossed around on our Play Selection Committee – the response often was, “That old thing? I’ve seen that a million times”. Funnily enough, I hadn’t ever seen it. Written in 1955, BUS STOP was one of the favorites plays written by William Inge. (He also wrote PICNIC, COME BACK LITTLE SHEBA, among others.) When Marilyn Monroe starred in the movie version, it became even more popular and famous. But the play suffered from being a product of a style and era of theater that had gone out of fashion.
We read it as a committee and liked it, so decided to do it as a play reading, to see how it played to a contemporary audience. We’ll be using the Skylight Bar Monday, March 10th at 7:30, with the actors reading simply from the text in our usual reader’s theater style. We have lots of patrons who love the form – we hope you join us.
BUS STOP is set in the 1950’s in a café in the windy and snow-swept plains of Kansas – where the bus stops intermittently during the day and night and nothing spectacular happens. The world of BUS STOP is the world William Inge grew up in. Born in Independence Kansas in 1913, Inge liked to write plays about people from small towns, where you knew people well – knew their dreams, their secrets, their loves, their failures.
The charm of the piece is its characters. We have a great cast to read them, too: Julie Swenson (our Producing Director) plays Grace, the world-wise café owner; Brian Mani plays Will, the Sheriff; Drew Brhel plays Dr. Lyman, the philandering academic; Toni Inzeo, plays Elma, the wide-eyed high school girl behind the counter; Jim Fletcher plays Carl, the bus driver; Andy Truschinksi plays Bo, the rowdy cowboy; and Carrie Coon plays Cherie, the nightclub singer on the run from him. Come to the reading and see how this 1950’s classic romance plays out in 2008!
By Marie Kohler, director of BUS STOP
what kind of equipment do you need…I know the place for you. Wheel and Sprocket is having their 24th Annual Bike Expo at State Fair Park, Wednesday, March 19 – Saturday, March 22. 
