Peninsula Players presents reading of ‘Chapatti’

Penny Slusher will star as “Betty” in the Peninsula Players reading of ‘Chapatti.’ Submitted photo.

On March 2, Peninsula Players Theatre will present a reading of Chapatti, a funny and gentle play centered on two animal lovers who meet in an unexpected way and rediscover the preciousness of human companionship.

Written by Irish playwright Christian O’Reilly, the play just experienced its world premiere in March 2014 through Skokie, Illinois-based Northlight Theatre, which can also be credited for helping bring the play to Door County for the Peninsula Players’ winter series of play readings, “The Play’s the Thing.”

Northlight Theatre did a full production of the play, in which a female caregiver to 19 cats meets a man and his dog, Chapatti, at a Dublin veterinary office. Northlight’s artistic director BJ Jones then passed it along to Peninsula Players Artistic Director Greg Vinkler as a potential performance for the Door County theater.

While Vinkler felt the play was a bit too small to be done on the Players stage, he still wanted to bring it to local audiences.

“I still loved it so I thought making it part of the play reading series was one way of getting people to hear it without having to do a full production,” Vinkler said.

“I think it’s just a lovely story,” he added. “It’s about two older people who get connected in an unexpected way, who are both lonely in the world but are wonderful people in their own right, but not able to be real sociable. The nice thing about it is as they connect through the play, it’s not sentimental, it’s beautiful.”

Vinkler will play “Dan” alongside Penny Slusher, who starred as “Betty” in the Northlight Theatre world premiere. Players company member Tom Mula will direct Chapatti.

Peninsula Players Artistic Director Greg Vinkler will portray “Dan” in ‘Chapatti,’ written by Irish playwright Christian O’Reilly. Submitted photo.

Though Vinkler sees the appeal of Chapatti as its focus on relationships toward the latter part of life, he is confident that this is a play people of all ages will want to hear and that the monologue format is one of the best ways for that to happen.

“Readings are the simplest, purest form of theater in a way because it’s just the actor, the words and the audience – there’s nothing else in between,” Vinkler said. “One of the wonderful things about that is the audience brings to the reading their imagination to fill out the rest of it. In my experience with theater, an audiences’ imagination is by far the richest, most beautiful place to make the theater happen. In your mind, you can fill it out more magnificently than any other production that could be done. It’s a very rich experience that way but it’s also wonderfully direct and intimate. That kind of audience-actor interaction is always lovely.”

The final Players winter play reading will be held April 6, featuring two yet-to-be-published one-acts, I Shall Love you Forever by Kathleen Thompson and Waiting for Tina Meyer by Kristine Thatcher and Larry Shue.

The reading of Chapatti will be held at 7pm on Monday, March 2 at Björklunden, 7590 Boynton Lane in Baileys Harbor. Free admission and general seating available. For more information on Peninsula Players Theatre, visit PeninsulaPlayers.com or call 920.868.3287.