Bakersfield College actors agree that the reference to raising atomic flowers serve as the appropriate metaphor for the explosive atmosphere of the household profiled in Paul Zindel’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play “The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-on-the-Moon Marigolds” currently in production at Bakersfield College and directed by BC theater instructor Randy Messick.
The BC production will debut Wed., March 8 and will continue March 9, 10, and 11 starting at 8 p.m. with a 4 p.m. matinee Sunday March 12.
The production is being shown in the S.A.M. building in room 107.
Speaking of the production’s location, Messick remarked that, “not many plays are done here” (in S.A.M. 107). However, Messick finds the room’s atmosphere “very intimate.”
Messick said “Marigolds” is a “great play,” and that it focuses on the relationships between a bitter, cantankerous, alcoholic mother named Beatrice and her two daughters, the troubled, epileptic Ruth and the sensitive, intellectual Tilly.
Speaking of Beatrice, Amy Hall, who plays her, said Beatrice has “several mental issues” and that she “finds it hard to be a good mom.” Beatrice, according to Hall, “sees the world through her own eyes,” and that she tends to “blame everyone” for her life.
BC student Samantha Gonzales, who plays daughter Ruth, says that her character is “very insecure, very confused, very complex, extremely volatile, and doesn’t know what her place in the world is.”
Beatrice’s other daughter is Tilly and is portrayed by BC student Jessica Zinn who says that her character is “very confident, complex, sensitive and very academic.”
According to BC student actor Katie Goehring, on the periphery is Tilly’s science project contest rival, Janis, played by Goehring. Goehring says that her character is a “snobby little girl who doesn’t try very hard and just skims through and doesn’t really work.”
Speaking of the mother, Beatrice, Messick remarked, “Drunks have their moments; they realize, ‘I’m pathetic! I’m a loser!'”
Messick summed the play up by saying that the mundane aspects of life are fuel for the fire in the play’s all-female household.
“Pedestrian things take on mammoth proportions in this play. That’s what’s so fascinating about this play,” he said.