Metropolitan Playhouse
Virtual Playhouse
Presents
A Screened Reading
of

HE SAID AND SHE SAID

Written by ALICE GERSTENBERG

Directed by ALEX ROE

Featuring
KELLY COOPER, TERESA KELSEY, ERIN BEIRNARD, ALYSSA SIMON, & JOHN LONG

www.metropolitanplayhose.org/virtualplayhouse

March 27, 2021 8 p.m.

Looks like Enid invited the wrong lady to dinner. But which lady is the “wrong” one?

First to arrive is Mrs. Packard, immediately identifiable as Town Gossip Supreme. Her strategy is obvious and obnoxious. “They” are saying this-and-that. She is not saying it. She is simply letting Enid know what “they” are saying.

After stirring-up Enid’s emotions, Mrs. Packard gives the same treatment to Diana when she arrives. Enid has conveniently gone upstairs. Different accusations and innuendos, of course, aimed at upsetting Diana. But Diana has a different attitude and snaps right back at her. Ouch. Mrs. Packard is insulted and huffs off to another room.

Enter Enid’s husband, Felix. Poor naïve Felix. Diana has a go at him about what’s being said. The story becomes more scandalous and exaggerated with every repetition. Felix, stunned, remains wide-eyed. Then best friends Enid and Diana get into a toxic confrontation about it all. Mrs. Packard is back and smirking with satisfaction. Her mission has been accomplished. She just keeps repeating her mantra: “I didn’t say it. ‘They’ are saying it’”.

A great double-twist ending resolves everything. Sort of. <wink>

First published in 1922, the same story, in many ways, still happens daily somewhere on our planet. That nasty viper slithers in to stir the pot of mistrust and doubt. The message here…Hiss back!

-Karen D’Onofrio-