By RHEA-FRANCES TETLEY
Staff Writer
The Heisler Theater Company is re-creating Mercury Theater’s radio show script of the story of Treasure Island, with performances this weekend, July 5 to 7 at the Tudor House.
The original Mercury Radio show was series of hour-long radio dramas performed by Orson Welles’ Mercury Radio Theater Company. This script of Treasure Island was the second show that was broadcast over the air in July of 1938, exactly 86 years ago this month.
The story of Treasure Island is from the adventure-filled novel by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson, telling a tale of buccaneers and buried gold. In the story, Billy Bones, an old sailor, arrives at the rural Admiral Benbow Inn in England. He tells Jim Hawkins, the innkeeper’s son, to keep an eye-out for “a one-legged seafaring man.”
Black Dog, a former shipmate of Bones, confronts Bones and engages him in a violent confrontation. A map that belonged to a pirate, Captain Flint, which leads to buried treasure, is found, and that is where the story gets more exciting as Jim is taken hostage. And how is the mysterious Long John Silver involved? The story solves the nagging question of who will be the first to find Captain Flint’s buried treasure on Treasure Island and, ultimately, who lives and who dies.
The actors of the Heisler Theater Company are experts at engaging the audience in the story, especially with their expressive radio style acting, complemented with scene-setting lighted backdrops.
The audience is not distracted by falling pages of script as would have been common in the old radio days, because they use cell phones for the scripted words. They have been rehearsing at various locations across the mountain, since The Tudor House has been used as a movie location these past few weeks. The lights will be controlled by Matthew Merola, for an impactful effect for this show.
The cast includes Alex May as the Young Jim Hawkins; Samm Starr, the Older Jim Hawkins; Gayle Heisler, Mother Hawkins; Maynard Smith, Long John Silver; Mark Lugan Trujillo, Dr. Livesey; Stephen Sandlin, Billy Bones; Michael Brewer, Black Dog; Dana Merola, Captain Smollett; and Jeff Heisler is the Narrator.
The performances will be Friday, July 5 and Saturday, July 6 with dinner at 5:30 and show at 7 p.m. The Heisler Theater company is proud to offer Rocky’s Roadhouse sandwiches for dinner and Sunday lunch to the Tudor House audience. The sandwiches will be $15 with two sides each. The Sunday matinee will have the snacks and sandwiches at 3 p.m. with the show being performed at 4 p.m.
The Tudor House is located at 800 Arrowhead Villas Road in the Arrowhead Villas area of Lake Arrowhead, just off Highway 18. Children under 12 are free, teens are $10 and $15 adult tickets are now available at www.HeislerTheater.com.
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