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Readers Theatre will hold auditions for its production of Fireflies on March 31 in the Lakeside Commons Classroom. Sign in by 10 am. No preparation is necessary; you will be asked to read excerpts from the script. Please bring your calendars to identify any conflicts with the morning rehearsals (April 7, 14, 21, and 28, May 5 and 12, the dress rehearsal on the afternoon of May 18, and the performance on the evening of May 19. The play by Matthew Barber features the prospect of a late-life romance in a small Texas town between a retired schoolteacher and a smooth-talking drifter. The performance will take place in the Chapel before an audience of invited guests. Director Barbara O’Malley will cast the following characters:
- Eleanor Bannister: A stern woman living alone in a neglected house and feeling somewhat unmoored as her role in the community has come to an end.
- Abel Brown: A personable drifter interested in renovating Eleanor’s deteriorating property (and perhaps Eleanor).
- Grace Bodell: Eleanor’s devoted neighbor who is suspicious of Abel’s unsolicited intrusion into her friend’s life.
- Eugene Claymire: A young cop (and Eleanor’s former student) tasked with investigating Abel’s activities.
For more information, to obtain script excerpts, or to arrange an audition before March 31, contact Barbara (her email address may be found in the Resident Directory).
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Our Most Recent Productions
On the evening of March 10, twelve actors read the parts of some 53 different characters in A. R. Gurney’s play, The Dining Room.
Our first play of the 2025-2026 season was 12 Angry Jurors, based on the classic 12 Angry Men. Readers of both genders performed the play in the Chapel on the evening of November 18.
Other Dramatic Opportunities
In September of 2025 Readers Theatre sponsored seven sessions for reading aloud The Great Gatsby in celebration of its 100th anniversary. Without auditions or rehearsals, about two dozen residents participated, some of whom were then cast in 12 Angry Jurors. A short discussion followed each session, along with a party at the end.
On December 8, 2025, four Readers Theatre actors performed a dramatic reading of O. Henry’s short story, The Gift of the Magi, for a group of Arbor Ridge residents. We hope to make other presentations there every three months or so.
All About Readers Theatre
Do you enjoy reading plays? Have you ever performed in live theatre? Maybe, like many folks our age, you’d like to play a role, but you’re afraid you’ll forget your lines. Not to worry. Our group sits at tables with scripts in-hand and enacts dramatic characters for each other and our friends. Our performances are closer to radio drama than fully staged theatre.
Readers Theatre is an open group of Riderwood residents who enjoy choosing plays together, working with directors to audition for roles and rehearse them, reading them with full vocal characterization, then discussing our productions. We hope that our subtitle for the group, “The Play’s the Thing” (borrowed from Hamlet), conveys the idea that we want to have some fun with our shows, even when we do serious drama.
We began Readers Theatre in the Fall of 2022. Our opening
production was The Skin of Our Teeth, a comedy by Thornton 
Wilder, followed the next February by The Mousetrap, an
Agatha Christie mystery. At this writing, we plan to produce Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler in May.
Our second season began with a public performance of Under Milkwood. Next we tackled Arthur Miller’s classic play, The Crucible, followed by Jean Giraudoux’s satirical comedy, The Madwoman of Chaillot. That summer we gave a public performance of The Revlon Girl, by Neil Anthony Docking.
For 2024-2025 we began with Continuity, by Bess Wohl, in another public performance. Our winter play was Appropriate, by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins. Noël Coward’s Hay Fever closed the season.
A volunteer Steering Committee together with an Artistic Director head the Readers Theatre group. They select the plays we are doing and determine our casting policy. We are committed to racial- and gender-flexible casting to ensure a broad choice of plays and maximum participation. Double-casting also allows us to spread out the rehearsals and do two separate productions for each half of a long show.
After a short audition process, each cast meets separately for five or six rehearsals on Tuesday mornings. before performing their half of the play, usually with the cast for the other half as their primary audience. A Monday dress rehearsal prepares the cast before they perform the play on a Tuesday.
Please contact Bruce McConachie, Artistic Director,or Maggie Hayes, Steering Committee chair, for more information or about joining the group.