by James O’Barr
When last seen at Harlequin, former Playwright in Residence Bryan Willis gave Halloween a run for the ghostly with Edgar Allen Poe—The Poet’s Journey, recreating the last months of Poe’s all-too-short life. He’s back now with another evening of theatre-making, this time in collaboration with Linda Kalkwarf, and the occasion is a more glad-hearted one, or maybe all heart. For while Valentine’s Day has become an extravagant celebration of romantic love, when consumers buy more chocolates, flowers, and jewelry than on any other day of the year, and businesses count the profit, the play was inspired by the words of the writer and artist Zelda Fitzgerald: “Nobody has ever measured, not even poets, how much the heart can hold.”
Kathryn Dorgan, herself a four-star member of Olympia’s theatre community, directs a stellar cast of couples, each representing a different age, a different stage of the mating game. A series of illustrative scenes are tied together with readings of what Willis calls “snippets of wisdom, culled from a variety of writers and thinkers, that guarantee inspiration for lovers of all ages.” Of the lovers on stage, Jana Tyrrell and Brian Tyrrell will rightly portray the most seasoned, with a total of 26 Harlequin seasons and 38 shows between them. Paige Doyle and Drew Doyle, well-known in these parts, and parks, and varieties of performance venues, as members of Animal Fire Theatre, are seen most summers in Shakespeare outdoors, and most recently, with a production of Uncle Vanya, indoors at the Lord Mansion. Jonah Barnett and Austin Barnett are the, uh, newish weds. Austin is definitely newish, coming as he does as a first-timer to the Harlequin stage, so we’ll look forward to being astonished. Jonah Barnett will also have one Harlequin credit to add to an otherwise long list of accomplishments as a filmmaker, multimedia artist, and writer.
Playwright Willis says that the cast is “a splendid ensemble that could make assembly instructions for a waffle iron sound fantastic,” and that the play “is intended to be a love song with universal appeal.” Hoping to inspire playgoers to bring their own love songs/poetry to the occasion, the audience will be asked to submit them during the intermission, no matter whether freshly minted or borrowed, to be read by the actors at the beginning of Act II. As for how much the heart can hold, a timely question any time, especially in the present moment, my own borrowed words come from the actor Audrey Hepburn, and you can quote me: “The best thing to hold onto in life is each other.”
WHAT
All the Heart Can Hold – A Valentine’s Oratorio
WHEN
Friday, February 14, 2025, 7:30 pm
WHERE
Harlequin Productions, The State Theater, 202 4th Avenue, Olympia
COST
$20
LEARN MORE
https://harlequinproductions.org/show/a-valentines-oratorio/
(360) 786-0151