Chagrin Valley Little Theatre

The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild by Paul Zindel

Performance Dates & Tickets

About the Play

"…an immensely funny, imaginative, inventive comedy…" - ABC TV

Directed by Michael Rogan

Starring: Lisa Tarr, Adam Young, Heather Hersh, Coletta "Louie" West, Jim McCormack, Jennifer Leinweber Ritz, Lisa Ann and Eric Oswald

In the tiny living quarters behind the Greenwich Village candy store which she operates with her husband, crowded with her forty-year collection of movie magazines, Mildred Wild has virtually escaped from reality into the dream world conjured up by the 3,000 movies she has eagerly devoured. And when the outside world does intrude—via her husband; his meddling sister; their hard-boiled landlady; the mincing butcher from next door; or the foreman of the wrecking crew sent to tear down the building—Mildred meets each crisis with a hilarious fantasy-scene drawn from her precious lode of old movies.

As the action moves swiftly ahead to its delightfully unpredictable climax, Mildred's life is further complicated by such unlikely visitors as a bulldozer, a nun, King Kong, and a super efficient TV camera crew, all adding to the merriment and, ultimately, to the poignancy which infuses the play and the touching, funny escapades of its kooky, lovable and totally enchanting heroine.

About the Playwright

Paul Zindel (1936 - 2003) wrote his first and most successful play, The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, in 1964. The play ran off-Broadway in 1970, and on Broadway in 1971, and he received the 1971 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for the work. It was also made into a 1972 movie by 20th Century Fox. Charlotte Zolotow, then a vice-president at Harper & Row contacted him to writing for her book label. Zindel wrote 39 books, all of them aimed at children or young adults.

Many of these were set in his home town of Staten Island, New York. They tended to be semi-autobiographical, focusing on teenage misfits with abusive or neglectful parents. Zindel himself grew up in a single-parent household, his mother worked at various occupations: hat check girl, shipyard worker, dog breeder, hot dog vendor, and finally licensed practical nurse, often boarding terminally ill patients at home. They moved frequently, and his mother often engaged in "get-rich-quick" schemes that did not succeed. His father abandoned them. This upbringing was most accurately depicted in Confessions of a Teenage Baboon.

Despite the often dark subject matter of his books, which deal with loneliness, loss, and the effects of abuse, they are also filled with humor. Many of his novels have wacky titles, such as My Darling, My Hamburger, or Confessions of A Teenage Baboon. The Pigman, first published in 1968, is widely taught in American schools, and also made it on to the list of most frequently banned books in America in the 1990s, because of what some deem offensive language.

Mr. Zindel's other plays include Let Me Hear You Whisper, The Ladies Should Be In Bed, And Miss Reardon Drinks a Little, Every 17 Minutes the Crowd Goes Crazy, Ladies At The Alamo, and Amulets Against the Dragon Forces.