TAA Member Mary Kay Switzer directed a special performance on June 15 of her original adaptation of Chekov’s “The Bear”, which she put in an old West format. The show was a fundraiser for a local food bank, Carol’s Kitchen.

The name of the play is “Rocky Roads: Black Bart Returns”, and involves one of old California’s notorious bandits who called himself a Highwayman and Poet and left poems at all of his stagecoach and bank robberies. Contrary to his reputation, he never shot anyone. But he did send many of his poems to various famous newspapers of the time. Switzer used some of Black Bart’s actual poetry within the play.

During the production, the audience is urged to dress in Western attire and has a chance to “Boo and Hiss” the villain. The play was presented under the auspices of The Cultural Alliance and A Repertory Theatre, of which Switzer serves as Artistic Director.

Last year, Switzer directed and wrote the play for Banning, California’s Centennial Scholarship Fund, “Wyatt Earp: The Great Stagecoach Robbery,” based on an actual unsolved robbery and included the character Wyatt Earp who was raised on a farm near Banning and was a teenager when this robbery happened while he was riding shotgun for the Wells Fargo Stage lines.