Yearly production of ‘The Old Peabody Pew’ is Dec. 5 in

Buxton

BUXTON – Buxton’s holiday classic, “The Old Peabody Pew,” will have a fresh look this year, featuring some new costumes and a cast with a blend of new and returning performers.

The Dorcas Society of Hollis and Buxton, a charitable and literary organization, sponsors the two-act, romantic comedy written by children’s author Kate Douglas Wiggin. Wiggin founded the society and the play was first performed in 1916.

This year, the curtain rises Sunday, Dec. 5, at 5 p.m., in historic Tory Hill Church, at the intersection of routes 202 and 112 in Buxton.

Filling lead roles this year are Timothy Wilbur of Portland, who plays Justin Peabody, while Courtney Wescott of Standish plays Nancy Wentworth. Both are new to the production. The setting of the play is in the quaint church with its wooden pews. In the plot, the nearly penniless Peabody, after failing to make his fortune, returns home from Detroit and wins the heart of the unmarried Wentworth.

Carla Turner, who owns Quillcote, Wiggin’s former summer home in Hollis where the play was first performed in a barn, produces the show. Amberlee K. Edgerton Moriarty of Biddeford is the director this year.

“It’s going to be a spectacular show,” Edgerton Moriarty said to the cast she gathered for a pep talk before dress rehearsal on Sunday.

Wescott, a Buxton native and Bonny Eagle High School graduate in 2002, began preparing a year ago for her part.

“I came last year to scope it out,” Wescott said about the 2009 show. “I’m ready.”

“Its fun, I’m looking forward to it,” said Wilbur, who landed the part three weeks ago.

The play also features a host of returning players, including Carolyn Vail, who has played the character Miss Maria Sharp for 17 years.

“I have them down,” Vail said about her lines. “I didn’t have to look at my books this year.”

This year’s production will be filmed for airing on Saco River Community Television, but taping the play is not a first. Teivy Manuel, 93, who again has the reader’s role, said the play was filmed several years ago and a tape is preserved in the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C.

Besides some new talent, the play this year is spiced up with some new replica costuming. Camille Bourque, who has played Mrs. Baxter for several years, will don a new gown, which Turner created. “We all said it’s time,” Bourque said about replacing her previous dress.

A veteran actress in the play, Linda Caouette, who has the role of Lobelia, thinks she has been in the annual production for 15 years. But her enthusiasm hasn’t waned.

“Every year it’s interesting, that never changes,” Caouette said.

Other performers are Chris Turner as Mrs. Miller; Candie Mayhew, Mrs. Sargent; Jane McCarthy, Mrs. Burbank; Katie Fratoni, the Widow Buzzell; and Alice McMachen, Alice Bixby. Cameron Mayhew is the sexton and Catherine Lamson is the stage manager.

Before the Tory Hill show, play-goers can attend the free Regional Advent Choir program at 4 p.m. on Sunday, Dec. 5, at the 20th annual Festival of Trees, sponsored by Buxton Garden Club, which opens at Bar Mills Community Church, 13 Hermit Thrush Road, Buxton. The festival runs through Dec. 13.

Courtney Wescott helps Tim Wilbur with his vintage costume before dress rehearsal Sunday for “The Old Peabody Pew.” Wescott plays Nancy Wentworth and Wilbur fills the role of Justin Peabody in the holiday classic at 5 p.m. on Sunday, Dec. 5, at Tory Hill Church in Buxton.
Staff photo by Robert Lowell