The Ballad of the Sad Cafe August 23, 2009

Signal Ensemble Theatre presents 'The Ballad of the Sad Cafe,' directed by Ronan Marra. There is the lover, and there is the beloved. Amelia Evans is the despotic proprietor of The Sad Cafe, located in a small Georgia town's center in the 1930s. Lymon - a strange hunchback that turns out to be a relative Amelia's never met - becomes the target of her unlikely affection, forming an unusual love triangle when her estranged husband Marvin returns. When Marvin threatens to leave with Lymon if she doesn't acquiesce to his demands, she refuses, and the husband and wife settle the matter violently in front of the entire town. Albee's signature piercing dialogue propels this 1963 adaptation of the Carson McCullers novella.