Bigfork Community Players prepare 'Jake's Women'

The Bigfork Community Players are in final rehearsals for Jake’s Women, the third Neil Simon comedy produced by the Players this season. 

 “Jake’s Women is a serious comedy,” says director Karen Kolar.  “It’s full of humor and warmth, but it also has a thematic heart;  it touches on several of life’s issues including love, trust, guilt, and staying in touch with reality.”

David Vale, who directed the previous comedy, Rumors, plays Jake in this one and contrasts the two plays.  “Rumors,” he said, “was a farce, a form of comedy in which the humor and the resultant good feelings derive from the situation rather than the characters.  Jake’s Women is more serious.  Although we’re able to laugh at the trouble Jake gets into juggling his real and imaginary women, we’re also able to follow an arc of character development as Jake learns to love, to trust, and to forgive.”

The story revolves around the title character, Jake, who is a very successful writer, not unlike Neil Simon himself.  But Jake, at the age of 53, still struggles with issues of trust with his late parents, guilt about his late wife, and distress over his failing marriage.  And issues of control, which he maintains in his writing yet routinely loses in his life.  Like a classic hero, Jake is endowed with a special gift for writing, for creating experiences in his readers that take them to an alternate reality.  But he can’t stop writing, even when he’s not, and the distinction between his writing and his real life has become a blur.

Michele Shapero plays Jake’s estranged wife, Maggie. “Jake is stuck in a time warp,” she says, “reliving the fantasy marriage to his first wife.  I play the second wife, a woman who has grown in character and maturity to the point Jake can no longer relate to her.  She loves Jake, but she just can’t live with him anymore.  Something’s got to change.”

“Jake’s Women offers that rare opportunity to see our own imperfections reflected from the stage,” offers Kolar, “to laugh at the humanity they imply, and perhaps to leave with insight that relates in a positive way to our real lives.  Those who see Jake’s Women are going to experience an emotional roller coaster.  And at the end of the ride, they’ll look back and say with excitement, ‘I think I lost my heart at the first drop.’”

Jake’s Women will play for just one weekend at the Bigfork Center for the Performing Arts.  

Shows are at 7:30 p.m. on April 10 & 11 and at 2:00 p.m. on April 11 & 12.  Tickets are $15 for adults, $10 for students and seniors, and $5 for those under 12.  They are available at Bigfork Drug, the Pocketstone Cafe, the Kalispell Grand Hotel, at the door, and at www.BigforkCommunityPlayers.com.