 Political Suicide is the newest work by playwright Ernest Thompson, who received much acclaim for his play on Golden Pond. River Company and Damaroscota will be presenting the main premiere of Political Suicide later this month, and Ernest Thompson came to Damaroscota recently to talk about his career and his new play. Tom was there and has this report. Dressed in jeans and a t-shirt with the name of his latest play on it, Ernest Thompson, Academy Award-winning author of On Golden Pond, stood before an audience at Skidamfa Library in Damaroscota and talked about the inspiration for Political Suicide. I said I watched the debates as I'm sure some of you did and... Well, let me put it to you this way. I was inspired. Not by candidates, but I was inspired to write a play. There was an expression back in the 60s that the best and brightest should be drawn to politics and I think we've drifted a little far from the best and brightest. Political Suicide is actually four short comedies, all looking at some aspect of the American political process. Margot O'Leary, a River Company board member and actress in one of the plays, commented on the timeliness of River Company's production. I guess we just got so... Just not to discuss it, but crazy about the whole process and so political suicide, I thought. And it's so timely that we're going to be doing it right before the election, too, The times created a play really, you know, I really wanted to talk about where we are in our culture and our society and the ineffectiveness of the electoral process because so few people vote, which is ridiculous. And I wanted to try to light fires for people. Andrew Handel, president of River Company and director of one of the plays, talked about what it means for the theater company to do this play. It's a great honor, really, for River Company to be the first company to be producing this play other than his own company. And we're going to have an opportunity to create roles and really do this work of art in our own way with our own interpretations. Charlie Waterman, founder of River Company, values the opportunity to work with the author. It's good to get his insight on each one of those four plays because it certainly helps us as we set out to do it. You can imagine what might be going through his head when he comes back to see how we do his play. River Company board member Ann Foskett will be directing two of the plays and was responsible for contacting Ernest Thompson about producing the play. One of the reasons he's here and one of the reasons that I got to meet him and his lovely partner Karen is that a friend of mine went to see his new play in New Hampshire and immediately emailed me and said, River Company has to do this play. It's your kind of play. When Ann Foskett introduced me, she talked about how lucky you were to have me here. And you are. How lucky I am that you are giving my plays a whole. I love it that this River Theatre Company has embraced doing political suicides. Very meaningful to me. And I appreciate also that you, the audience, support a theater like River Company. You know, I liked your plays you've done. I liked that you're so adventurous here. And I thought that if someone's going to take on a play like Political Suicide, it's got to be a theater company with some imaginations and courage. Katherine Wilkinson, a local actress, commented on what Ernest had to say. And it's cool to hear him say that he wrote, directed, acted and produced and something because those are all things that are so time consuming and the fact that he can put all of them together and create a masterpieces is really inspiring. It's very illuminating to find out about him as a writer and what he cares about, how important writing is, what he thinks plays and theater can do to teach and inspire people about what's going on in their own lives and in their world. Matt Peters, an actor in one of the plays, gave his reaction after reading the play. It sounds hilarious and just, you know, the timing of it is perfect that we're doing this, you know, right before everyone's going to go vote and that saying rock the vote is involved with it. It's great. I mean, that it's definitely something a lot bigger than all of us and it sounds, it's going to be hilarious. I want to completely see it because it'll be the first time I've seen those plays done by anyone other than myself. I consider the emotional success of this play to be as profound as anything I've ever been involved with. People laugh and then by the end you see people wiping their eyes because there's hope at the end of these plays. There's still a possibility that we could make a change. River Company's production of political suicide will be performed at Skadamfa Library in Damerskada on September 28th, 29th and 30th on October 5th, 6th and 7th. Reservations can be made by calling 563-8116. This is Tom Handel in Damerskada for Community Update.