Amelia Community Theatre
Press Release
Linda McClane
Executive Director
March 30, 3018 5:15 p.m.
The acclaimed drama “Doubt, a Parable” winner of both the Pulitzer Prize and the Tony Award for Best Play, opens April 5 at Amelia Community Theatre, 207 Cedar Street. It is sponsored in memory of Char Bachman, an actor, director, and artist in our community who passed away in 2017, and who had greatly admired this show.
The thought-provoking play, with a suggested rating of PG-13, takes place at a Catholic school in the Bronx in 1964. Sister Aloysius, the school principal, suspects the priest assigned to the school of having an improper relationship with a male student. The student seems troubled, but there is no solid evidence, and details from a young nun who is a teacher at the school are ambiguous. Sister Aloysius begins her own investigation, questioning the student’s mother, and confronting the priest, Father Flynn, who denies the accusations.
Thus begins a gripping mystery, written by John Patrick Shanley, set in the midst of a power struggle between the old way of doing things and the new ways, both in the church and society. This provocative play is “less about scandal, and more about the nuanced quest of moral certainty,” wrote a reviewer for Variety when the show premiered on Broadway in 2005. The 2008 movie version starred Meryl Streep, Amy Adams, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Viola Davis.
Directed by Jennifer Webber, the ACT cast includes Sam Cobean, Katie Stanley, Sara Payne, and Catherine West.
Performances are at 8 p.m. on April 5-7, 12-14, 19-21 and at 2 p.m. on April 15. Tickets are $22 for adults; $10 for students through college, and available at www.ameliacommunitytheatre.org or by calling 261-6749. The opening night party at 7 p.m. for the April 5 audience will be hosted by the ACT Guild, with complimentary appetizers and beverages. Box office hours at ACT are 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays.