Following the lights

Tom Titus

She’s the new girl in town, virtually just off the bus from Iowa, she

landed a major role in Golden West College’s upcoming production of

“Dancing in Lughnasa” and she’s writing an original play in her spare

time.

But what Mary Good really wants to do is direct.

The 21-year-old actress was bitten by the acting bug at the tender age

of 12 and has been pursuing her dream ever since. Now a Huntington Beach

resident, Good is looking forward to pursuing the many avenues of theater

offered in Orange County.

She has a string of theater credits from her Midwestern roots,

including minor roles in “The Miracle Worker” and “Inherit the Wind,”

but Good maintains her most memorable experience in the theater to date

wasn’t acting, but writing.

“We did a series of comic sketches titled ‘But Seriously,’ and I wrote

about 75% of the material,” Good recalls. “It was really exciting to see

something I’d put together getting audience reactions.”

She’ll undoubtedly be getting more reactions next weekend when

“Dancing at Lughnasa” opens its two-weekend engagement in the main Golden

West theater. Good portrays Agnes, the rebellious sister among a quintet

of siblings in a rural Ireland environment.

“Agnes is sort of like I was in Iowa,” Good declares. “She wants to

get away and make a better life for herself. I can identify with that.”

Growing up in the Midwest, Good fell under the influence of her

mother, a singer, who, she recalls, would “take me to the supermarket and

talk with a different accent every time we started up another aisle.”

That was valuable basic training for her Irish character in

“Lughnasa.” Good also can handle Southern, Canadian, British, Scottish

and, of course, upper Midwestern accents.

The latter inflection came in handy during her “Inherit the Wind”

experience, during which playgoers raised Meredith Willson’s famed “Iowa

stubbornness” to a new level. The play, you may recall, is a thinly

disguised dramatization of the 1925 Scopes “monkey trial” in Tennessee,

in which a young educator is accused of teaching evolution, which didn’t

set well in the “buckle on the Bible belt.”

“The people were really upset about the subject matter,” Good said.

“In order to put the play on, we had to conduct a seminar on the pros and

cons of evolution after every performance.”

Good is in her first year at Golden West and works part-time as a

floor manager at Sun Coast Video in the Westminster Mall. In her spare

time, she’s working on an original play entitled “Oil and Coffee,” which

mirrors her own experiences somewhat.

“It’s about a girl in her early 20s who lives with an alcoholic aunt

and has blocked out all emotion in her life,” Good says. “I’ve been

working on it for some time, but just really started getting serious

about it.”

At the moment, her focus is on pastoral, early-century Ireland and

Brian Friehl’s comedic drama about a group of sisters seemingly trapped

in a meaningless existence. For Mary Good, It’s been anything but

meaningless.

“The cast has been wonderful,” she declares, and our director, Tom

Amen, has encouraged the actresses playing the sisters to do things

together and bond. I’ve really enjoyed working with all of these people.”

Does her future hold a career as an actress, a playwright or a

director? Or possibly all three?

“I really don’t care,” she declares, “as long as I can make a living

doing something Ilike.”