Description:

By America's great comic playwright, Neil Simon, this memory play is set in Yonkers in 1942. Bella is thirty-five years old, mentally challenged, and living at home with her mother, stern Grandma Kurnitz. As the play opens, ne'er-do-well son Eddie deposits his two young sons on the old lady's doorstep. He is financially strapped and taking to the road as a salesman. The boys are left to contend with Grandma, with Bella and her secret romance, and with her brother Louie, a small-time hoodlum, in a strange new world called Yonkers.

Sign up to audition here:
https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0D4CA4A929A0FB6-48424616-lost

Dates / Times:

  • Friday, Jul 26th @ 7:00pm
  • Saturday, Jul 27th @ 2:00pm
  • Saturday, Jul 27th @ 7:00pm
  • Sunday, Jul 28th @ 3:00pm
Tickets go on sale Saturday June 1, 2024 at 9:00am

Ticket Prices:

  • $18.00: Standard Ticket Price
  • $15.00: Group Ticket Price
    (Ticket Minimum: 10)

CYT Theater:

5024 Southpoint Parkway, Fredericksburg, VA 22407

Characters:

Jay

Eddie's older son, Jay is a strong-willed and responsible young person. Though he wants to be helpful, he is often naive and a bit misguided in his attempts to show maturity. He tries to be a good role model for Arty throughout the play, though they do have a typical sibling relationship as well, with Jay teasing Arty and Arty pushing Jay's buttons.

Arty

Eddie's younger son, Arty is the more sarcastically comical one of the two brothers. He tends to use jokes as a coping mechanism, and looks to Jay for approval, while also developing his own opinions of his family's situation.

Grandma Kurnitz

Grandma Kurnitz is the mother to Eddie, Bella, Louie, and Gert, and grandmother to Jay and Arty. Having escaped Germany during WWI with her husband and children, she is an incredibly tough woman who has become calloused by the struggles in her life. She treated her children with a very "tough love" mentality, in order to teach them to survive, but which in turn has made them full of disdain towards her in return.

Bella

While in her 30's, Bella lives at home with her mother still, taking care of her and cooking for her. She is hospitable, kind, and full of dreams, though she has the mind of a child, tends to not make logical sense, and can become overwhelmed. Even still, she is very sharp and able to read people and situations well, and becomes more confident and independent as the play progresses.

Louie

The oldest son to Grandma Kurnitz, Louie is a smooth-talking, erratic man who is clearly mixed up in some shady dealings in his "occupation." Though he doesn't like his mother, he does respect her and explains that her toughness made him a stronger person. He acts as the boys' male authority figure while their father is away.

Eddie

Eddie is one of Grandma Kurnitz's sons and the father to Jay and Arty. He is a loving father, trying to work hard to pay off debts after paying for his late wife's medical expenses. He is emotional and sensitive, which his mother disapproves of, while he resents her for the way she treated him and his siblings growing up.

Aunt Gert

The other daughter of Grandma Kurnitz, Gert has an odd breathing condition that she developed as a child out of fear of her mother. She is incredibly patient and acts as a referee between her siblings, and is arguably the closest sibling to Bella.