I remember when I had to wait six months (or more) for a performance by Portland Story Theater. God must really love me, because I've seen them perform twice in the last three months - once around Valentine's Day and once last weekend, for their Mother's Day show: "Everybody's Got One."
If I were the sort of person given to hyperbole (heaven forfend!), I'd say, I wish every storytelling concert could be like this! To me, it seemed perfectly paced - the humor, the heartbreak, the mindboggling "Wow, I wish I'D seen that!" and the cringing "Yeesh, I'm glad that wasn't ME!"
I'm a huge fan of original material. There is something about personal narrative that engages me like nothing else. Maybe that's why the stories of childhood and adolescence had me rapt on the edge of my chair. So often, I hear people telling stories about childhood experiences, and they haven't really gained much emotional distance. The stories have become engraved and enshrined as part of a personal mythology. The meaning of those events has remained the same over the years. In the stories I heard last Friday, the tellers revealed how the meanings of their stories had changed; how their understanding of events had shifted, sometimes gradually, over years, and sometimes in a flash. Wow.
There's one more weekend to see "Everybody's Got One" - Friday and Saturday, May 12 and 13. I don't know when the next PST performance is planned, but I do know you don't want to wait six months. Lynne Duddy, Anne Penfound, Lawrence Howard and Rick Huddle have really put together something special. Go see!
Location, time, and other info is at their Web site, www.portlandstorytheater.com.
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