This funny, yet heart-warming story intertwines events across the lives of three generations of the Belanger family, revealing transitions and rites of passage that are at once, familiar and timeless. Janet Torreano Pound describes families as “strangers who are thrown together for eternity.” Her message of the heart is that the impossibility of communicating to those closest to you is often offset by the miracle of those sometimes-wordless moments that happen between family members that bind them together in the hardest of times, and make life worth living.
The Belanger family consists of Olivia, the feisty matriarch played by Henrietta Hermelin (Southfield); Oliver, her grandson who wants to be a stand up comic is played by Chris Roady (Detroit); and his loving parents, Dan and Karen, who are an unlikely match for life, portrayed by Lisa Betz (Detroit) and Aaron T. Moore (St. Clair Shores).
According to director Lavinia Hart: “Bringing a new play to life is a high calling for theatre artists. We have a strong, experienced cast and we’re enjoying the process of working with a playwright of Janet Pound’s talent and theatrical sensibilities.”
Ms. Pound is a talent agent for Affiliated Models, Inc. and has won national and local recognition for her short plays over the past several years. Birds of a Feather is her first full-length play.