Painting Churches

Painting Churches is a play written by Tina Howe, first produced Off-Broadway in 1983. It was a finalist for the 1982 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. The play concerns the relationship between an artist daughter and her aging parents.

The play grew from Howe's particular and enduring experience of art. Howe said: "Now... I'm enthralled with the French Impressionists." One theme of the play is an artist's coming of age. Howe: "How does a child get his parents to accept him not as a child, but as an artist?... There is an odyssey every child has to face in order to find his legs in his own household... The play is also about the departure of a vanishing breed..."

In a townhouse in the Beacon Hill area of Boston, an elderly couple, Fanny (in her 60s) and Gardner (in his 70s) Church, are packing. They are moving to a beach home on Cape Cod. Gardner is a poet and Fanny is from a "fine old family." Their daughter Margaret (Mags), an artist who lives in New York, has arrived to help them pack and paint their portrait. Over the course of several days, Mags sees her role in the parent-child relationship changing. Gardner is having memory problems and has become frail, and in his frustration, recites the poetry of William Butler Yeats and Robert Frost, among others. Mags finishes the portrait of her parents, in the style of Renoir. Her parents are able to see Mags talent, and enjoy being in a "Renoir" party as they dance a waltz.

Painting Churches, produced by Second Stage Theatre, premiered Off-Broadway on February 8, 1983 (previewing from January 25, 1983) at the South Street Theatre, closing on February 27, after 30 performances. The play transferred to the Lamb's Theatre where it ran from November 22, 1983 through May 20, 1984, playing 206 performances.

The production was directed by Carole Rothman, set design by Heidi Landesman, costumes by Linda Fisher, and lighting by Frances Aronson. The show featured Donald Moffat as Gardner Church (at South Street Theatre) and George Martin in the same role (at Lamb's Theatre), Frances Conroy as Margaret Church (at South Street Theatre) and then Elizabeth McGovern (in the same role) (at Lamb's Theatre), and Marian Seldes as Fanny Church (in both productions).

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