In Acacia Theater’sheartwarming production, which opened last weekend, this trip is more about thetravel than the arrival. And it is simply and gracefully wrought in thecharacter of Carrie Watts. Forced to live with her overprotective son, Ludie,and his spiteful, uncaring wife, Jessie Mae, the aged, hymn-singing Carrielongs to return to her roots in the rural, idyllic town of Bountiful,Texas. Evenif just for a visit, the trip would provide an escape from the two-room“prison” of an apartment that all three share in Houston. Past attempts to run away have beenfutile: Carrie’s family has repeatedly stopped her efforts, mostly because hermonthly government checks are crucial to their survival.
Mary Ellen Atwood’sstirring performance as Carrie galvanizes this production about one woman’sdetermination to achieve her goal through faith and belief. Throughout the115-minute performance (no intermission), Atwood fills the stage with a rangeof emotions that evoke as well as provoke: We feel her sense of hopelessness,hands clenched, rocking back and forth, as she reaches out to her past; we alsosense her frustration as she’s forced to come into contact with a vindictivedaughter-in-law. As the self-centered Jessie Mae, Mary Rynders finds a perfectbalance between spitefulness and forgiveness in a performance so well nuancedthat it takes someone with her experience and background to make it work.
This Trip is well worth taking, if only tolearn that “home” is where the heart resides.
The Trip to Bountiful runs through May 16 in the Todd Wehr Auditorium at Concordia University.
