Matinee Friends

Six Matinee Friends returned to one of our favorite small theaters to see “The Rainmaker” at the Don Bluth Front Row Theater on Saturday afternoon, April 16. The story takes place in the 1930s on a cattle ranch in a western state on an extremely hot summer day in the middle of a terrible drought. Their cattle are dying and they are desperate for rain. The characters are plain Lizzie Curry and her father and two brothers. The men are worried that Lizzie will never find a husband and have tried to match her with various men, including the deputy sheriff. Then a sweet-talking traveler stops by, promising he can make it rain, for $100. He also works his magic on Lizzie as he persuades her that she has a very real beauty of her own. He’s forced to leave the next day, just as the thunder and lightning herald a welcome summer rain. The walls of the theater were decorated in props and scenery that made us feel that we were right in the house with them (though the A/C made it hard to feel we were sweltering in 103 degrees). We felt it would have been very hard to find actors who would have fit their parts any better than those we saw! Everything about this production was top-notch and very enjoyable.