“Messiah” is the story of Dwayne Hightower (Tim Robinson) and his wife, Lou Ann (Sharla Fasko) who live in a trailer park. Their only luck is winning a new Frigidaire refrigerator, which unfortunately, is too big to get into their trailer so they keep it outside. Dwayne always has high hopes for striking it rich, but his plans never come to fruition.

Living next door is Betsy Gridley (Cynthia McComb) who is a best friend to Lou Ann and a big pain to Dwayne. They constantly clash.

This trio provides a majority of the action and dialogue in this John Culbertson scripted Tom Wagner directed comedy. Slipping in and out of the action are the Reverend Cecil Hodges (Steve Horvath), Larry Williamson (Dan Kwiatkowski), Ronny, the Blind Boy (Derek Kastner) and in a short – if not show – stealing scene, Anna Francis as Mama and the Stranger.

To summarize the story, one evening Lou Ann and Betsy see a shadow on the refrigerator that looks like the face of Jesus; to Dwayne it looks like Willie Nelson. But, when Dwayne reads in a magazine how thousands visited a home where someone saw a cross in the bathroom window, he realizes it’s his chance to “strike it rich.” The field along the trailer park is set up to handle the many people who come to see the miracle. The mayor, Rev. Hodges and councilman Larry Williamson want to keep the miracle going
because it’s an economic boom to the town.

Into the trailer park comes a woman with a blind boy. She believes that if they can touch the
refrigerator, his sight will be restored. When they do and nothing happens, she turns on the boy. This scene made me feel very uncomfortable for the woman beats the boy because he “didn’t believe in Jesus.”

Lou Ann can take no more. She takes clippers and cuts the bushes almost to the ground in anger and frustration. It is then that a Stranger (celestial?) appears and tells Lou Ann all will be alright. When Dwayne comes on the scene and sees what has happened to the bushes he cries that he needed “two more weeks.” But as he looks at the new shadow on the refrigerator, it is now Elvis and once again he is going to strike it rich.

There is a lot of good humor in this script but in order for it to make an impact, timing and body
language are most important. There were often “pregnant” pauses which tended to slow down the action and make the humor less than it was. The cast seemed to feel it was necessary to cross to the table and chairs on stage right, often for no apparent reason. Although this is a comedy, there were several serious moments, as when the woman leaves the stage with the blind boy and Lou Ann is in a rage about how God could allow such things to happen. But, the show needed a little more pace. There were several poignant moments that could have really lifted the play but they didn’t.

In his first lead role, Tim Robinson was very good as Dwayne. He looked and talked the part. Cynthia McComb was full of boundless energy. Her Betsy was well done and her timing very good. Tim and
Cynthia played off each other very well. In contrast to Betsy, Sharla Fasco’s Lou Ann was mostly
underplayed, especially in the scene Mama and the boy. Anna Francis, in two very brief appearances, lit up the stage and made both of her characters – Mama and the Stranger – believable. Derek Kastner was excellent as the Blind Boy. Steve Horvath was quite good as the Reverend Hodges as were Dan
Kwiatkowski and Larry Williamson.

The set was workable and looked just like a trailer you would find in one of those parks, although the lawn furniture was perhaps not something found in such a locale.

“Messiah” was a good show that could have been better.