March 13 , 2025 The Beacon • 13

By Marianne Austin For The Beacon

Produced by Ann Rollman and directed by Kathy Reid and Denny Blanford , assistant director , “ Leaving Iowa ” is a family-friendly comedy by Tim Clue and Spike Manton .

Don Browning is a middle-aged writer bringing his father ’ s ashes back to his childhood home for burial and discovers his grandmother ’ s house is now a grocery store .

“ The play is about a family who goes on a road trip vacation . The cast is mom and dad and the children with some time-jumping along the way , showing then and now . If you have ever been in a car with your family and traveled across the country , you will identify immediately with the lines that are said in the play . We have either heard them or said them or both ,” Reid said .

One of the familiar lines in the play is “ If you need something to cry about , I ’ ll give you something to cry about .”

Reid said , “ When I heard that , I thought , ‘ Oh my gosh , I ’ ve heard that , and I ’ ve said that .’ This gives you a little idea of some of the comedy that is in this play . This is the kind of play that I enjoy directing , and there are also some very poignant lines in the play as well .”

Marianne Austin The cast is pictured practicing a scene at the vegetable stand .

Reid encourages people to come out and enjoy the play .

“ It ’ s a great way to relive and look back at some of those golden moments from your past ,” she said . “ Definitely , this will pull up some of those wonderful memories and some maybe not so great times , but it will certainly make you laugh and help you remember some of those tender moments that you spent with your family . I have directed several plays here at Triple Locks , and this is one of the plays that I really enjoyed doing .”

Chris Hart ’ s character is the dad . He has done many one-man shows portraying about 65 different characters and some little theater .

“ I made my debut on this stage 15 years ago ,” Hart said . “ This is the first time I ’ ve been back , so I am very excited . I have done other plays in New Philadelphia , Cambridge , lots of little theaters , and I am also a living historian , which means I bring historical characters to life . I remember a lot of road trips with my family which were probably very much like this . It ’ s a fun role ; it really is . It is a great cast to work with , and I get to work with my wife , who is in the show as well , and that ’ s an added bonus .”

Eric Conkling plays the older version of the son , Don .

“ We ’ ve all been on road trips , great memories , not so great memories ,” Conkling said . “ It ’ s a flash back . I play the older Don , and we flash back to Don as a child in the back seat of the car listening to mom and dad and brother and sister fighting . The growth is in

my character because I am older now . We have car scenes and then back to me talking about the car scene and what I thought when I was a kid and what I realize now as an adult . It is very funny . There are all kinds of emotions .”

Nathan Mayse started doing shows at Triple Locks in 2003 .

“ I ’ ve been pretty much nonstop onstage and backstage , directing , filling lots of different jobs for different productions , building a lot of the sets and decorating . I ’ ve done almost everything at this point . We needed someone , and I worked with Kathy a lot in the past . She is great to work with , so I jumped right in ,” Mayse said .

Mayse plays multiple characters . He is one of the community town ’ s people and people the cast sees in their travels .

Cast start out on their road trip .

“ Totally different costumes , and that has been really fun putting on different personalities ,” Mayse said . “ All of our characters are told about throughout the story , so I think we have more freedom to be a little larger than life because we are being talked about as a memory . We are not an actual person right then . It has

Marianne Austin

given us a little leeway with our costume and character .”

The play will run Friday and Saturday , March 14-15 and 21-22 at 7:30 p . m . and Sundays , March 16 and 23 at 2:30 p . m . The Triple Locks Theater is located at 685 N . Whitewoman St . in Coshocton . For ticket information visit www . footlightplayers . com .

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