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THEATER Plumbing the depths of meaning Comment By Bill Varble for the Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By Bill Varble for the Mail Tribune Posted Dec. 10, 2014 at 5:10 PM Updated Dec 16, 2014 at 12:03 PM By Bill Varble for the Mail Tribune Posted Dec. 10, 2014 at 5:10 PM Updated Dec 16, 2014 at 12:03 PM --> If you go What: "The Quality of Life," by Jane Anderson, a reading staged by Ashland Contemporary Theatre When and where: 8 p.m. Dec. 15, 18 and 20, with a 2 p.m. matinee Dec... » Read more X If you go What: "The Quality of Life," by Jane Anderson, a reading staged by Ashland Contemporary Theatre When and where: 8 p.m. Dec. 15, 18 and 20, with a 2 p.m. matinee Dec. 20, at the Ashland Community Center, 59 Winburn Way, Ashland; and at 8 p.m. Dec. 19 and 2 p.m. Dec. 21 at Grizzly Peak Winery, 1600 E. Nevada St., Ashland Tickets: $12 at Paddington Station in Ashland and the Grocery Outlet in Medford For more information or to reserve tickets: Visit ashlandcontemporarytheatre.org or call 541-646-2971. » Social News When Lue Morgan Douthit, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival's literary guru, gave Jeannine Grizzard a script of Jane Anderson's hit play "The Quality of Life," Grizzard was bowled over. "I knew immediately I had to do it," says Ashland Contemporary Theatre's artistic director. When Grizzard asked Peter Alzado about directing a dramatic reading of the award-winning play, the Oregon Stage Works founder likewise made haste. "I'd read it and liked it very much," Alzazdo says. ACT plans repeated readings of the play the week of Dec. 15 at the Ashland Community Center and at Grizzly Peak Winery, both in Ashland. "The Quality of Life" had its premiere at the Geffen Playhouse in Los Angeles in October 2007, directed by the author. It won the L.A. Drama Critics Circle's 2007 Ted Schmitt Award for outstanding world premiere play in Los Angeles, the 2008 Ovation Award for Best New Play and was a nominee for the 2013 Jeff Award for Best Production of a Play. The play's success rocketed Anderson immediately to elite status, with representation by the William Morris Agency and licensing by prestigious Samuel French. The play is the story of two couples with very different values, each trying to face tragedy. Dinah and Bill, a conservative, church-going couple from Ohio, are struggling to keep their lives intact after the death of their daughter. Dinah reconnects with her earthy, liberal cousin Jeannette, who lives in Berkeley, Calif., and whose husband, Neil, is dying of cancer. Neil and Jeannette have also just lost their home to a wildfire. "It's like Corn Flakes meets granola," Alzado says. "It's really about people from very different perspectives dealing with tragedy, how they view those tragedies and how they accommodate them." The show goes to the heart of such hot-button issues as the "right to die," medical marijuana, alternative versus traditional lifestyles. But Grizzard says it's not simply a liberal screed; rather, the humanity of both couples is fleshed out. In addition to directing, Alzado will play Bill, the conservative Midwesterner. Grizzard plays Jeannette. Diane Nichols is Dinah, and Ashland newcomer Jesai Jayhmes is Neil. "It turned out we thought I should play Bill," says Alzado, an equity actor whose lengthy resume includes appearances on Broadway. Jayhmes is new to the valley but brings an impressive resume. He worked and studied in England (at the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art, one of the leading drama schools of Britain), his parents were producers, he taught at Yale and was in a Dutch acting company. "He has a lean, runner's body and is the perfect temperament for the philosopher-king part," Grizzard says. "The interesting thing about that play is it's really an affirmation of life, and everything life throws at you," Alzado says. "That no matter what happens, we need to move on and live our lives. "When we have these tragedies, some people go into depression, some buckle, some commit suicide, some will continue living a full, vibrant, vigorous life." In the play, Neil and Jeannette seem to have accepted their situation with equanimity, living in a yurt on their burnt-out property and celebrating life with tokes of pot and glasses of good red wine. Bill and Dinah at first are moved by the other couple's ability to keep an even keel. But their sympathy turns to rage when they find out that Jeannette is planning to take her life rather than face life without Neil. "That's where the play's heart is," Alzado says. "The liberal from Berkeley deals with pain a certain way, the Christian from Ohio a different way. Both are ways we buffer ourselves against the ways life buffets us. "They don't live in a lie, they begin to tell the truth, whether it happens to be a philosophical perspective or a religious one." "If somebody is afraid of heights, and somebody else is afraid of sharks, the essential ingredient there is fear. These couples find ways to buffer themselves, but they're both buffering." Even though ACT and Oregon Stage Works are dong the small-cast play as a reading and not a full production, Alzado envisions a rehearsal schedule of as much as 40 hours. "Any way you cut it, if you're going to interpret a piece of material, you need to plumb the values that are there in the script," he says. He says he's a fan of readings, which offer actors and audiences another way of getting to the bottom of a playwright's work. "To my mind, a lot of actor training is not meant to look at the values on the page," Alzado says. "It's more about layering on top of the script. "Really, the job is to find the values in the script. ... You're in service. How do you plumb the depths of meaning? It's kind of like being told a story. "If the resources are available, you'd want to offer the same kind of interpretation as in a production. An audience knows if they're being told the truth." "The Quality of Life" will be read at 8 p.m. Dec. 15, 18 and 20, with a 2 p.m. matinee Dec. 20, at the Ashland Community Center, 59 Winburn Way, Ashland; and at 8 p.m. Dec. 19 and 2 p.m. Dec. 21 at Grizzly Peak Winery, 1600 E. Nevada St., Ashland. Tickets are $12. For more information, visit ashlandcontemporarytheatre.org or call 541-646-2971. Reach Medford freelance writer Bill Varble at [email protected] . By Bill Varble for the Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By Bill Varble for the Mail Tribune Posted Dec. 10, 2014 at 5:10 PM Updated Dec 16, 2014 at 12:03 PM » Comment or view comments Reader Reaction » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. Southern Oregon Directory Featured Businesses Loading... 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