"Honeymoon at Graveside Manor" - by Pat Cook - Pasture Prime Players (Charlton, MA.) - REVIEW
(Cover Photo: The CAST of Pat Cook's "HONEYMOON AT GRAVESIDE MANOR" presented by Pasture Prime Players in Charlton, MA. now playing through November 9, 2025. Photo Credit Victoria Konopacki)
By Kevin T. Baldwin
METRMAG Reviewer
# 774-242-6724
“Lead me to your ectoplasm."
- ("Madge") / Pat Cook
Pasture Prime Players
Presents Pat Cook's
"HONEYMOON AT GRAVESIDE MANOR"
Written by Pat Cook
Directed by Stephanie Sawyer
Producer Don Konopacki
Cast Includes: Greg Glanville as "Myron Thorncraft," Angela Clark as "The Woman," Christopher Lam as "Tyler Thorncraft," Hillarey Robertson as "Marian Thorncraft," Kirstie Clemente as Sophie," Dawn Sedlier as "Madge Perkins," Ducati Sedlier as "Durward," Tiffany Betty as "Judy," Sarah Tonkin as "Suzanne," Joe Sawyer as "Officer Blair."
Additional Creative Team:
Stage Manager and Stage Hand - Morgan Caseday; Costuming - CAST; Set Design - Stephanie Sawyer, Don Konopacki; Technical Director and Lighting & Sound Operator - Don Konopacki.
Performances:
October 31, 2025 through November 9, 2025
(Contact Box Office for Exact Times)
Performances to be held at Pasture Prime Players, 4 Dresser Hill Road, Charlton, MA.
TICKETS:
Reservations may be made by calling # 508-248-5448.
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(Warning: The following review contains spoilers)
Pasture Prime Players presents the ghoulish goulash that is "HONEYMOON AT GRAVESIDE MANOR" to varying degrees of success.
While arriving on the heels of Halloween, for a show billed as a “ghostly farce,” even with the obvious effort put in by the show's cast, Pat Cook’s "HONEYMOON AT GRAVESIDE MANOR" <ahem> “pales” in comparison to other superior farces and “ghostly” comedies.
Is the play amusing? Absolutely.
Could the play have been hysterical? Absolutely.
While some issues stem from the Pasture Prime direction taken, it is the material itself that comes up short at times.
The two-act play, written in 1993, is supposedly set in the “present.”
Given the above, a director can either set the show in 1993 or try to move it to present day.
So, while assuming it is set in 2025, this assumption soon gets disproved with multiple references, such as one made of someone going out in the middle of the night to “fax” something.
At another point, someone is asked to take a photo, and they use their cell phone (sans flash) at a point where someone is supposed to be blinded by the brightness of the camera’s flashbulb.
Where the show does succeed, thanks to the staging by the cast under first-time Pasture Prime Players' director Stephanie Sawyer, is in the area of physical comedy resulting from mistaken identities, slamming doors, prat falls, spit takes, and implausible coincidences.
Done well in the show, the only thing missing from a couple of “romp” sequences in the story is some “Scooby Doo” music accompanying it.
(Photo: Hillarey Robertson as "Marian Thorncraft," Dawn Sedlier as "Madge Perkins," Kirstie Clemente as Sophie," and Greg Glanville as "Myron Thorncraft" in a scene from Pat Cook's "HONEYMOON AT GRAVESIDE MANOR" presented by Pasture Prime Players in Charlton, MA. now playing through November 9, 2025. Photo Credit Victoria Konopacki)
"HONEYMOON AT GRAVESIDE MANOR" unfolds as horror writer Tyler Thorncraft (Christopher Lam) brings his bride, Marian (Hillarey Robertson), to his family’s supposedly haunted house for their Halloween honeymoon.
What Marian does not realize is that the rural family home was actually once a funeral home.
Both Lam and Robertson give admirable performances as the harried married couple caught up in the antics of others who are on site at this the supposedly vacated property.
The couple first encounters the lovable local cleaning woman, Sophie (Kirstie Clemente), who, as written, carries much of Cook’s biggest laugh lines.
Clemente does well in sustaining the comedy and certainly earns the laughs her character receives.
Bungling police officer Blair (Joe Sawyer) and Tyler’s mouthy publicist-editor, Madge Perkins (Dawn Sedlier) also arrive on scene for purposes completely (and thankfully) unrelated to the couple’s honeymoon.
Blair is searching for escaped mental patient Myron Thorncraft (Greg Glanville) who is also on the premises to blow it up.
Perkins is on site to assist Tyler on his new novel.
While the performances by Sawyer and Sedlier are fine, costuming for the pair was ill-advised as was the decision in allowing the cast to costume themselves.
(Photo: Ducati Sedlier as "Durward" sneaks up on a donut perusing Christopher Lam as "Tyler Thorncraft" in a scene from Pat Cook's "HONEYMOON AT GRAVESIDE MANOR" presented by Pasture Prime Players in Charlton, MA. now playing through November 9, 2025. Photo Credit Victoria Konopacki)
A trio of high school sophomores sneaks into the house intending to pull pranks on some friends.
These teens - Durward (Ducati Sedlier), Judy (Tiffany Betty) and Suzanne (Sarah Tonkin) add much to the story as the actors, together and separately, supply the strongest performances, weaving in and out of the action on stage.
For some reason, Judy and Suzanne wear “Pink Ladies” jackets from the musical “Grease” presumably for Halloween costumes.
And yet, while the jackets are pleasing, at no time is there any reference made to the girls being involved in a high school production of “Grease” and since there is virtually little mention made of Halloween, the assumption that people will understand the reasoning behind this costuming choice is lost.
As the “ghostly presence” on site, Angela Clark worthily plays “The Woman” – an axe-wielding “spirit” that stalks the honeymooning couple virtually unseen…while simultaneously is apparently not able to pass through walls as she needs to open and close every door at every turn.
On numerous occasions, I have stressed the critical importance of knowing where the comedic beats are in scripts to execute the split-second timing required in such plays written by the likes of Neil Simon and others.
The same is obviously true with Cook’s "GRAVESIDE MANOR" as there feels like there should be a breakneck speed delivery reminiscent of a “Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” episode.
However, most of the breakneck speed delivery in "GRAVESIDE MANOR" is lost, sacrificed for the sake of an actor’s “nuanced delivery” usually accompanied by unnecessary reactions.
When staging a comedy like this, a director should always look at the script and, wherever they see a “period” (.), they should assume a laugh is there – then, eliminating almost every single potential pause imaginable, they can continue forward to the next set up and punchline.
(Photo: The CAST of Pat Cook's "HONEYMOON AT GRAVESIDE MANOR" presented by Pasture Prime Players in Charlton, MA. now playing through November 9, 2025. Photo Credit Victoria Konopacki)
The above could even be blamed on the playwright if no clear instructions to the above are given in the script, meaning even a more experienced ensemble would have found it difficult to successfully execute the material.
More rehearsal seems to have been required in transitioning the page to the stage as the jokes don’t always land and many gags seem absent.
Beyond the script, there were some backstage noises where people could be heard quite clearly repeatedly moving from one side to another, bumping into things along the way.
More time to smooth out these rough edges would have aided "HONEYMOON AT GRAVESIDE MANOR" considerably but the earnest effort by the cast in virtually every other area is still obviously there.
Thanks to the single set design, there were no scene changes required, allowing the show to move fluidly from beginning to end.
Glanville is assigned the most rounded character in the Cook comedy to work with as the maniacal “Myron.
Glanville has a solid grasp of those aforementioned comedic beats, providing much of the show’s biggest laughs.
However, if afforded more opportunity to evolve, the actor might have better differentiated Myron’s two personalities, making one a little more distinctive from the other in moments where Myron is supposed to be arguing with “themself.”
The overall plot is absurd but, if there had been more of an opportunity to explore and refining the show, the end performances might have turned out a lot funnier.
At the November 1st performance, lighting cues were well handled but sound cues of gun shots were out of sync with the actions on stage.
For a night filled with kooks, spooks and surprises, book your reservation to see "HONEYMOON AT GRAVESIDE MANOR" which continues from Pasture Prime Players at 4 Dresser Hill Road in Charlton, MA. until November 9th, 2025.
Up next for Pasture Prime Players will be a landmark play from esteemed writer Lanford Wilson, the groundbreaking “HOT L BALTIMORE” in April, 2026.
For tickets and more information, contact Pasture Prime Players at # 508-248-5448.
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Approximately two hours with one intermission.
Kevin T. Baldwin is a member of the American Theatre Critics Association (ATCA)
@MetrmagReviews
@Theatre_Critics
ABOUT THE SHOW
Marian Thorncraft is looking forward to her honeymoon with new hubby, Tyler.
She pictures someplace romantic, secluded and cozy.
No sooner have her feet touched the ground after being carried over the threshold than she discovers her love nest is really a one-time mortuary!
"GRAVESIDE MANOR" - as the locals call it - has been abandoned for years, mainly due to the rumors of it being haunted.
Cozy as a bat cave, it is about as secluded as Grand Central Station.
A daffy maid shows up to clean the place and gets lost in the catacombs behind the walls.
This goes unnoticed because Tyler is too busy ducking a female ghost with a hatchet, three high-school kids trying to set up a Halloween prank and his wise-cracking female editor who once had a crush on him.
Throw in an absent-minded cop and the escaped lunatic he is looking for and the stage is set for a "HONEYMOON AT GRAVESIDE MANOR."
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ABOUT PASTURE PRIME PLAYERS
PASTURE PRIME PLAYERS, INC. is a volunteer regional theater organization based in Charlton, MA. and made up of a group of people from surrounding towns, who love the theater and the feeling of shared creativity experienced while taking part in a live stage production. It is the intent of the PASTURE PRIME PLAYERS to encourage the development of community theater in Southern Worcester County, to stage live theater performances for residents of the region, and to provide opportunities for everyone, especially amateurs and newcomers, in all aspects of stage production, be it lighting, advertising, set design, acting, music, financial management, design and publishing of programs, or any of the many tasks necessary for the successful production of plays.
