From drives to chips and water hazards to sand traps the women in the Ladies Foursome take 18 holes of golf to learn that the lives they’re navigating may not be all that they seem.
The story unfolds on the tee of each hole as four women play a game of golf in memory of their late friend Catherine, the day after her funeral.
In true Norm Foster fashion the production had the audience howling with laughter as the actors delivered their lines, gestures and facial expressions with perfect timing, sometimes leaving the audience wondering if they were adlibbing or were just that comfortable with the script.
The St. Jacob’s Country Playhouse production comes on the heels of the hilarious Men’s Foursome leaving Carmen Grant (Dory), Gabrielle Jones (Connie), Stacy Smith (Tate) and Karen Wood (Margot) with their work cut out for them.
Working together in a seamless fashion the four women stole the hearts of the audience and had theatregoers invested in the choices they made and the directions they chose to take their lives.
While at first it seemed the Ladies Foursome would just be a female version of the Men’s Foursome with comparable characters and starting storylines, it became clear early on that the Ladies Foursome called for sincerity alongside comedy in opposition to the Men’s Foursome where the audience was never sure what was truth and what was lie.
Connie, Tate and Margot begin the show as the three remaining members of the best friend golfing quartet. They ask Catherine’s friend Dory to play with them and what unfolds is not what any of the friends expected.
Connie, a celebrity television broadcaster, seems to have it all together moving from man to man without a care in the world. However, as the play progresses the audience learns just what lead to her cavalier dating life and that she may not be as open to love as she seems.
Jones plays Connie with ease and precision, never balking when she delivers a line that has the audience wincing and never breaking character when her line leaves the audience roaring with laughter (and there were times when the laughter went on and on).
Stay-at-home mom Tate seems to have the perfect life and her one worry as the golf game tees off is that she thinks one of her children is a little less attractive than the others because of his lazy eye. However, through stories and secrets it’s revealed that Tate’s life is far from perfect and she’s looking for a way to stand on her own two feet.
Smith’s interpretation of Tate is endearing and genuine. She has the audience sympathizing with her and laughing alongside her in the blink of an eye. And the way she defends her son at every mention throughout the play drives home her motherly instinct and showcases Smith’s acting prowess.
Margot, a business woman running a construction company, gives off a crude and tough vibe as she begins drinking beer before the morning game even begins and as she discusses her role in a man’s world. Yet, as the golf game evolves the audience learns that her actions are those of defense as she tries to ignore what she’s had to give up to rise to the top.
Wood excels at delivering Margot’s sarcastic lines with supreme comedic timing leaving the audience wondering if it was planned or off the cuff. She also seemliness transitions into a place of vulnerability when she discusses her estranged daughter in a way that has the audience sympathizing and wishing she’d just pick up the phone and call her.
Dory is the dark horse of the whole game, knowing secrets about Catherine’s friends with Connie, Tate and Margot not even knowing she existed. As the golf game unfolds Dory, a former Las Vegas singer turned northern Ontario inn-keeper reveals aspects of all their lives that the three friends didn’t know about one another and she drops a few huge secrets about the late Catherine that leaves her best friends flabbergasted.
Grant plays Dory with ease and expertise. Her facial expressions tell a story of their own and her voice inflection tells the audience she is not quite as content with her life in northern Ontario as she originally seems. With just the right amount of awkwardness and familiarity Grant does a great job portraying the outsider friend that knows a little too much about these strangers in her life.
When the golf game concludes each friend discovers just what Catherine meant to them and what they mean to each other.
The superb comedic timing and performance cadence is due to the brilliance of Marcia Kash. Even the sound effects were perfectly timed with the sound of each swing being expertly matched with precision to each golfer’s stroke. Sound effects were also used to further the story when a ball lands in a water hazard and when Dory’s ball hits a golfer from the group ahead of the ladies foursome in the back of the head.
Set designer Douglas Paraschuck, who also designed the set for the Men’s Foursome, recycled some aspects of the golfing set yet with tweaks like a raised tee-off location and different bench placement and model the set looked fresh and new for the Ladies Foursome.
The artificially-turfed stage gave off the impression of a real golf course and through the actors’ gazes, gestures and verbal descriptions the audience was able to picture just where the rest of the course lay.
The background trees were excellently painted giving off the perfect impression of the sun’s rays shining down through the leafed canopy.
With the help of lighting designer Siobhán Sleath the set looked just like a morning golf course.
Regular performance tickets are $44 for adults and $26 for youth under 20 years of age. Tickets for groups of 20 or more are $36. HST is applicable to all ticket prices.
The Ladies Foursome runs until Aug. 27. Tickets can be purchased in person at the St. Jacobs Country Playhouse, online at www.stjacobscountryplayhouse.com or by calling the box office at 519-747-7788 or toll free at 1-855-drayton (372-9866).
