|
| |
This story reprinted from Altoona
Herald
October 30, 2002
A PIECE OF MY MIND: Always ... Patsy Cline
By MARGARET LUDINGTON Herald-Index columnist
Patsy Cline's recording of "Crazy" remains the world's
most played jukebox tune 40 years after it was recorded.
Fans know every note of the song and every nuance of Cline's rendition.
That's why "Crazy" is the song Kaija Bonde likes to sing the least of the two dozen
Cline tunes in "Always ... Patsy Cline."
I see a lot of theatrical performances over the course of a year, but I almost never
talk to the actors. When the Des Moines Playhouse offered an opportunity to interview
Kaija Bonde and her co-star Jill Pillar-Johnson, I jumped at the chance.
I wanted to ask Bonde what it's like to play a well-known star like Patsy Cline and how
they keep going year in and year out with the same show. The touring company from Sioux
Falls, S.D., has been doing "Always" for four years.
When I met with Bonde and Johnson at the Playhouse Oct. 11, it wasn't hard to figure
out how they keep doing the show. These women are good friends who work so well together they can finish each other’s sentences.
Also, they love the show, and audiences love them loving it.
Bonde and her husband Brian founded the Comfort Theatre Company in Sioux Falls. They're
alumni of Sioux Falls’ community theatre and met on stage. That's also where they met
Johnson.
"Always" isn’t the only show they've done, but it's the most popular. When I saw the
show Friday night after the interview, I understood why. Bonde sings like I dream about
singing. But that's just half the show.
The other half is Johnson's Louise, the real Houston homemaker who met Patsy at a show
in 1961 and corresponded with her until her death two years later. If it's not illegal
to have as much fun as Johnson has playing Louise, it should be.
I felt I missed some of the flavor of the show seeing it at the Playhouse. The Comfort
Theatre Company does most of its shows in rural South Dakota.
They play high school gyms and hotel meeting rooms.
"There's either a basketball hoop or a chandelier in my kitchen," Johnson said of their
usual venues.
They've played to rowdy gambling hall audiences in Deadwood and to solemn Lutheran
farmers in farm country.
When Louise picks someone to dance with from the audience, it will turn out to be the
mayor, the sheriff or the community's oldest bachelor. It gives everyone something to
talk about for the next year.
Communities ask them back over and over. This was their second run in Des Moines.
"We bring people to the theatre who never go to theatre," Bonde said.
That seemed true at the Playhouse. Even at "State Fair" and "Oklahoma" I never saw
folks dressed in Western-cut shirts and cowboy boots. They were there this time.
From time to time, the women meet someone who saw Cline perform. In Rapid City they met
a steel guitar player who played back up for her. Those meetings are like gold because
they add the information to their store of understanding of what Cline was really like.
Performing is a hobby for Bonde and Johnson. Bonde has four children, the youngest is
autistic. Her husband Brian works at a Sioux Falls children's hospital. Johnson works
at another hospital in their in-house printing department and also has a family.
The Poker Alice Band, made up of Sioux Falls area musicians, travels with them part of
the time.
They’re having such a good time, I was tempted to ask if they need another roady. "It
beats flipping burgers for a part-time job," Bonde and Johnson agree.
|
