Release Date: November 9, 2004

MONMOUTH, Ill. – Psychiatrists, their patients and relationships in general will be lampooned when Monmouth College’s Crimson Masque theater group performs the side-splitting comedy “Beyond Therapy” Nov. 18-20 at 7:30 p.m. and Nov. 21 at 2 p.m. in the college’s Wells Theater.

Tickets are $4 for MC students, faculty and staff; $5 for other students and senior citizens and $6 for adults. Tickets can be reserved by contacting Bill Wallace at 309-457-2374 or by e-mailing him at billw@monm.edu.

Time Magazine theater critic Gerald Clarke wrote that the play, written by Christopher Durang, offers “the best therapy of all: guaranteed laughter. Durang’s plot, which has more bounces than a pin-ball game, goes from the unexpected to the unpredicted ... providing two hours of hilarious surprises.”

Directed by senior Phil Johnson of Wauconda, “Beyond Therapy” is the story of Bruce, played by junior Mike Wilmoth of Clinton, and Prudence, played by freshman Julia Barna of Darien, who are both in therapy and are both trying to find a companion. Prudence seems fairly normal, aside from the psychological damage dealt to her by her seductive therapist. Bruce, meanwhile, likes to cry, has a male lover and frequents a therapist who can’t get out of her own world long enough to help anybody.

The two hapless lovers meet over dinner only to end up angry and wet when the scene closes. The play then follows them to their respective therapists and through much more laugh-out-loud comedy. Or, as Dan Sullivan of the Los Angeles Times wrote, “Beyond Therapy” is “wickedly funny, terribly slanted and essentially true.”

Wilmoth and Darien are supported by sophomore Charlie Pippenger of Hawthorn Woods as Dr. Stuart Framingham; junior Kelly Winfrey of Peoria as Mrs. Charlotte Wallace; sophomore Chris Walljasper of Donnellson, Iowa, as Bob; and junior Josh Sonnenburg of Portland, Ore., as Andrew the Waiter.

The show, which features crude language, adult situations and partial nudity, is intended for mature audiences only and is not for those who may be easily offended.