(Press release)

SALADO, TEXAS (Sept. 29, 2008) – Tony Blackman, a 25-year veteran of theater, is the sad-shy-playful foreigner Charlie Baker in playwright Larry Shue’s “The Foreigner.” The southern comedy of manners opens Friday, Oct. 3, at the Silver Spur Theater in Salado, just off Interstate 35, for a seven-weekend, 20-performance run.

This year marks the 25th year for the award-winning play, the same amount of time that Blackman, who lives in Salado, has been in theater. Now, Technical Director for the Spur, he has performed in more than 20 shows, ranging from “The Fantasticks” and “Guys and Dolls,” to “H.M.S. Pinafore” and “The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged).”

Performances are at 7:30 p.m., Friday and Saturday nights, and at 2 p.m., Saturday matinees. Admission is $15 for adults; $12 for senior citizens, military personnel and students with I.D, and $8 for children. Matinee tickets are $10, $8 and $8, respectively, with group rates also available. For reservations, call 254-947-3456. For more info, visit www.saladosilverspur.com.

“The Foreigner,” winner of two Obie Awards, and two Outer Critics Circle Awards, is set in a B&B-fishing lodge in rural Georgia often visited by "Froggy" LeSueur, a visiting British demolition expert who occasionally trains recruits at a nearby army base. "Froggy" brings along his friend Charlie, a pathologically shy man who’s overcome with fear at the thought of making conversation with strangers.

Before departing, “Froggy” tells the widow Meeks, proprietress of the lodge, that Charlie is from an exotic foreign country and speaks no English. The fun begins as Charlie overhears more than he should, including evidence of some nefarious activities from locals who think he doesn't understand a word they say. Nonstop hilarity ensues, setting up the wildly funny climax, in which things go uproariously awry for the "bad guys" and the "good guys” emerge triumphant.

Ensemble Cast + Young Newcomer

Tony has appeared in film and television projects for The Disney Channel and Arkansas Educational Television Network, and his directorial credits include “LUV,” “Spoon River Anthology,” “Love Letters,” “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown” and “I Never Saw Another Butterfly.”

“In fact, the entire cast is a tightly knit ensemble of veteran actors, with the exception of Garrett Clark of Belton," says Grainger Esch, Co-founder and Executive Director of the five-year-old, 156-seat theater.

“Garrett, an enthusiastic 13-year-old, is making his stage debut as Ellard Simms, the simpleton brother of spoiled heiress Catherine Simms, played by Rebekah Grayson of Salado, last seen as Miss Goody Goody in the Spur’s summer melodrama.

Rebekah also has appeared on NBC TV's “Friday Night Lights,” as has Saladoan Tom Rolls who plays county property inspector (and racist) Owen Musser. He was Tonkawa Tom in the Spur’s melodrama and is a Clown College alumnus and a former juggling instructor there. He’s performed widely in major Las Vegas venues.

Esch, a former clown with the Ringling Bros., Barnum and Bailey Circus, portrays “Froggy,” while Betsy Tyson, also of Salado, handles the role of Betty Meeks. Tyson, last seen at the Spur as Melissa in the 2008 production of “Love Letters,” began as a child actor in Dallas. She worked at the Dallas Theater Center with famed director Paul Baker through the 1960s.

She has preformed and presented book reviews for Dallas book clubs as well as written, directed and produced children's plays -- adapted from books -- in Dallas area schools. In 2000, she became involved in Salado's Living Room Theater and was elected its President in 2008. The native Texan is a University of Texas at Arlington graduate.

The seemingly humble Rev. David Marshall Lee is played by Jacky Dumas of Temple, a drama teacher with extensive dinner, community and readers theater acting credits to his name as well as directing. He’s been seen in “1313 Raven Lane,” “Romeo and Juliet,” “Everyman,” “Annie Get Your Gun,” “The Music Man,” “Amadeus,” and many other shows in Monahans, Midland, Salado and Bartlett.