Troupe tells sex stories with a twist

What would a middle-aged couple do to spice up their sex life?

Well, Lou and Betsy Ballantyne take up a $5,000 offer to have sex on the local radio station. Not your cup of tea? Just read on.

In Norm Foster’s script for Bedtime Stories, a sharp radio announcer, Eddie ‘Nighthawk’ Nichols is hustling a new idea to get out of his low-grade market position.

He concocts a broadcast featuring a couple having live sex on air. But as the best-laid plans of mice and men often tend to go awry, so does this sure-fire romp in the hay.

Listening to the sexy capers is an audience with its own bedroom comedies peopled by a man dying of an incurable disease, a teenage groupie panting for an aging rock star, two burglars on a heist, an aging stripper and a disoriented taxi driver.

What Foster has done is construct a six-tier plot of bedroom yarns similar to the popular hit movie Love Actually. All the stories are inter-related and come full circle at the end.

“I was drawn to the way this show was put together. It’s like my favourite movies with multiple scenes. This one is connected by a radio show that unfolds as the show goes along,” says St. Albert Theatre Troupe director Katie Elliott.

She is working on final touches before its three weekend run April 26 to 28, May 3 to 5 and May 10 to 12 at the Kinsmen Korral.

Elliott is a 2005 Paul Kane graduate who enrolled in the Vancouver Film School for a 16-month intensive program. Three years ago, she moved back to St. Albert to take MacEwan University’s journalism program.

As the director, Elliott sees her role as “putting all the pieces together and helping the actors understand their character and what drives the play.”

And Bedroom Stories is the perfect actor’s vehicle creating outrageous characters with lots of room to flesh out their personalities.

“It’s like a sitcom. It has funny characters who play off each other. There’s witty banter and comedy, and the language is quick and funny.”

While the play is loaded with double entendres, Elliott wants to make it clear that the stories reveal different types of love and understanding from mature love and puppy crushes to a romance and a newfound friendship.

A straight ensemble piece, it gives equal weight to local actors Allan Grant, Andrea McHenry, Trevor Lawless, Mark McGarrigle, Rachael Cheechoo, Rhonda Kozuska, Graham Blackley and Elliott.

“There’s a lot of passion that’s been put into this show. Everyone is a volunteer and I believe it’s important for St. Albert to support the live arts. Besides you’re going to have a fun night.”