Branson Bound
2019
Branson Bound is a comedy set entirely aboard an over-the-road tour bus, where the seats become a rolling stage for a busload of senior citizens on a seven-hour pilgrimage to the entertainment mecca of Branson, Missouri. The trip is a chartered outing of First National's Silver Swarm retirement club, and from the moment the bus is parked in a Hardees parking lot at ten in the morning, it's clear the journey will be far more eventful than the destination.
Herding the travelers is Loretta, an irrepressibly cheerful tour director with a clipboard, a list of upcoming "gala" excursions, and a gift for announcing pit stops. At the wheel sits Happy Hank, a weary, sweat-soaked bus driver worn down by too many miles and too many Burger King stops. The passengers are a gallery of comic types: Floyd, a hard-of-hearing gentleman forever in search of the next rest break, and his patient wife Esther; Ginger, a flashily dressed, jewel-bedecked widow who never rotates seats and is never happy; Richard, a self-styled life-of-the-party blowhard, and his long-suffering wife Carol, who wants to open the trip with a prayer; and grandmotherly Verna with her reluctant teenage grandson Ely, who would rather be anywhere else.
What follows is a warm, sharp-tongued ensemble comedy built on overlapping banter, mishearings, and the small territorial battles of people sharing close quarters for too long. Beneath the one-liners about kidney stones, hearing aid batteries, and the dignity of getting old, Branson Bound is an affectionate portrait of a generation still game for the adventure of a lifetime, even if it never quite makes it out of the parking lot on schedule.
Cast
- Loretta — Stephanie Solterman
- Floyd — Brad Barnes
- Esther — Jody Heitbrink
- Ginger — Mary Beth Maloney
- Carol — Carrie Carls
- Verna — Tammy Guthrie
- Ely — Jax Dion
- Richard — Jim Yale
- Happy Hank — Tom Guthrie and John Love
Production Notes
Branson Bound was performed April 26–28, 2019. The production was directed by Jim Yale, who also appeared in the cast as Richard, and produced by Mary Jane Million. The single-set staging recreated the interior of a tour bus, with two rows of seats and a driver's seat, the rear row slightly elevated, opening on the bus parked in a Hardees parking lot as the Silver Swarm club boards for Branson.