It’s almost five o’clock in the morning, Valentine’s Day, 1952. A worldly-wise housewife, her young daughter, and her recently married sister-in-law are driving through Las Vegas. Just hours before, the mother, Kay (Rita Rehn), was excited to give her daughter, Lana Dee (Amelia Rose Allen), a gift she would never forget—driving to a place called Jackass Flats in Mercury, Nevada. But the sister-in-law, Virginia “Ginny” (Estelle Bajou), a Mormon country girl from Utah, unexpectedly drops in during the middle of the night, inviting herself on the road trip. Although the two women’s views on life clash throughout their journey, the three generations in the car get to their destination just in time to come together and witness an important turning point in the American evolution.
“Jackass Flats” will run through July 10 at Ellenville’s Shadowland Theatre in its premiere production. Seventeen years after writing the first draft of “Jackass Flats,” Napanoch-based couple C. C. Loveheart and John Simon completed the play. While still in the making, “Jackass Flats” was the winner of the Maxwell Anderson Award for best unproduced play of 1997. The play dives into the development of a mother-daughter relationship with a gambling and philandering husband and father.
Actor/writer/director Loveheart, who has appeared on television shows like “Law and Order” and “One Life to Live,” began writing the story in 1995. Her husband, veteran music producer Simon, who has worked with musicians like The Band, jumped on as coauthor two years later. The play is somewhat autobiographical; Kay is loosely modeled on Loveheart’s mother, a tough cookie but a well-respected homemaker who put family above everything. Loveheart also filters in her own Las Vegas experiences through nine-year-old tomboy Lana Dee.
Kay and Ginny are the classic odd couple whose mismatched experiences create the play’s comic tension. As 19-year-old Ginny tries to hold onto her Mormon moral perspective, she turns to Kay, a 40-year-old Vegas veteran, for guidance as she faces her new lifestyle and the unfamiliar world she married into. Both Kay and Ginny question their marriages and their husbands’ loyalty; Ginny realizes that even her values have contradictions; Lana Dee learns what the real world is all about. Jackass Flats is a place of revelation for the three, where through love and survival, they discover more about themselves. Although the men are spoken about, they are merely background noise in the play. The only other “character” present is the radio that plays cigarette advertisements and 1950s hits like “Tennessee Waltz.”
According to Brendan Burke, Shadowland’s artistic director and the director of the play, “Jackass Flats” is an innovative ensemble piece for women. “It’s got three great women’s roles. It’s difficult to find shows with roles that women can really enjoy and explore. That was a major priority while looking for a piece.”
The play, in a truncated form, was read at Shadowland’s Ulster County Playwright Festival in 2009. Now, it’s finally ready for its first full run. “I think it’s a great play that could eventually be published and have a life beyond here,” says Burke.
“Jackass Flats” will be staged through July 10 at the Shadowland Theatre in Ellenville. Thursday-Saturday, 8pm, $30; Sunday, 2pm, $25. Senior and Student Discount, $2. (845) 647-5511; www.shadowlandtheatre.org.
This article appears in July 2011.
