Tracey Johnston-Crum as Judy Bernstein. Photo by Rodney Smith
Holiday hilarity returns to Magnetic 375 this month with The 45th Annual Bernstein Family Christmas Spectacular. Shows will be held December 1–3, 8–10, 15–17 and 21–23 at 7:30 p.m. nightly, with 10 p.m. shows on December 10 and 17.
Producer Chall Gray co-created the irreverent holiday show, along with Mondy Carter and Karen Stobbe, in 2010 to “lampoon the ’50s-style holiday variety specials that many people saw (endured) on television growing up. We also wanted to create an alternative to the traditional holiday fare that we saw all of the other theaters doing,” he added. The show is billed as “for mature audiences only” for language, sexual innuendo and drug and alcohol use.
“People love to make this an annual part of their holiday season,” Gray says, “and I think it’s because nothing is sacred in the show. It’s fun to go see the holidays get made fun of when you’re in the midst of them and to be reminded that there are other families more dysfunctional than your own.”
Tickets sell out quickly. In fact, Gray says, there have been fewer than five performances in the show’s history that did not sell out and, in the last three years, every seat has been taken every evening.
“To take over direction of what has become an Asheville tradition is daunting to say the least,” says Jeff Catanese, who makes his directorial debut with the Bernsteins. “It is my hope that I’ll be able to do justice to the ridiculousness that the Bernstein Family Christmas Spectacular has become known for.” Catanese calls cast members Tracey Johnston-Crum, Darren Marshall, Glenn Reed, Erik Moellering and Kirby Gibson “among Asheville’s finest actors.”
Each year brings a new script. Local playwright Lucia Del Vecchio led the 2016 team of comedy writers that included Jim Julien, Peter Lundblad and Genevieve Packer.
The shows, Gray says, are “numerically challenged.” The initial show, for example, was the 27th Annual and last year’s was the 42nd. This will, in fact, be the show’s seventh year and the third year that it has been performed at Magnetic.
Gray co-founded Magnetic 375 with Steven Samuels in 2009 with the aim of producing original work. “One of the motivators for this,” says Gray, “was that, as a producer, I saw many great plays coming across my desk that had never been produced.” Breaking through as a playwright is difficult, he adds. “We wanted to do something to change that and to show people that there is a wealth of amazing theatre talent right here in Asheville.” To date, the theatre has produced almost 50 world premieres.
“Magnetic has become known for bringing alternative theater to the community,” Catanese says, “so it might seem odd to some that they have an annual holiday offering. However, Bernstein’s fits right into their canon and might even exemplify it.”
The Magnetic Theatre is located at 375 Depot Street in Asheville’s River Arts District. Advanced ticket purchase is recommended. To order tickets, visit themagnetictheatre.org.
