CCP’s ‘Shipwrecked’ Brings Adventure, Fun to the Stage

Carmel Community Players’ show director Lori Raffel gets goosebumps when she hears the words on the page brought to life.

“Shipwrecked: An Entertainment!” which tells the “amazing adventures of Louis de Rougemont, as told by himself, is “like a pop-up book for the stage,” Raffel said.

It’s filled with seasoned sailors, plus one scallywag and his dog Bruno. Louis de Rougemont invites theater-goers to hear his amazing story of bravery, survival and celebrity. Dare to be whisked away in a story of the high seas, populated by exotic islanders, flying wombats, giant sea turtles and a monstrous man-eating octopus.

The Carmel Community Players’ show — which opens Friday and continues with a total seven performances through Aug. 21 at The Cat in Carmel — is by the Pulitzer prize-winning Donald Margulies, one of Raffel’s favorite playwrights, who includes no less than 10 pages of instructions to the cast and director for the producing of this play, Raffel said.

“Much like Mr. de Rougemont, Mr. Margulies wants his story told with creativity, authenticity and love,” she wrote in her director’s notes in the playbill.

“Louis is the main character who tells the story, and he is naïve and innocent in a wonderful way,” Raffel said. It is storytelling with Louis as the storyteller and the two players — Player 1 and Player 2 — as most of the characters.

“Kind of a Ted Lasso from London at the turn of the century, which is when the story takes place,” Raffel said. “It’s a departure for me in a sense because I love a good David Mamet or Terrence McNally.”

The greatest ease is the cast. “The three players are a dream team. I have worked with each one of them before, Earl Campbell (of Noblesville, who was last seen as Ed in CCP’s “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.”), Vickie Phipps (of Carmel in her 37th production), and Joe Aiello (of Lawrence who studied acting in Central New York). To put them together on stage is pretty magical.”

The ensemble features Hannah Janowicz of Noblesville (who played the Mute in CCP’s “The Fantasticks,” Tom Smith of Westfield (who has never worked with the cast or crew of “Shipwrecked,” but has performed at The Belfry, Basile Westfield Playhouse, Booth Tarkington Civic Theatre and other theaters),  Margot Everitt of Indianapolis (making her CCP debut) and Jayda Glynn of Carmel (a senior at Carmel High School).

Her greatest challenge for this show was the props and costumes. There are more than 100 props and costume pieces that are used on the stage. “It needs to look like it is kids playing dress up and pulling things out of a trunk in the attic to make a show,” Raffel said.

Carmel Community Players had the show on its schedule before the pandemic. Raffel submitted the show three years ago and conducted auditions two years ago. She had the actors cast, but then came the Covid pandemic.

“There were a few possible stops and starts, but I finally decided that I would wait until this summer in this time slot to do it. The three original cast members were available but everyone else had to be replaced due to scheduling conflicts,” she said.

Raffel chose the play because of her past history. When she worked as a marketing and media relations director at the Phoenix Theatre in downtown Indianapolis, the theater did a production of “Shipwrecked.” She said, “My boss (the late Phoenix co-founder) Bryan Fonseca directed it, and Chuck Goad (Phoenix founding member) starred in it with Eddie Curry in fall 2009.

“I got to do the music for the show, but I always wanted to be able to direct it,” Raffel said. “The problem is finding the right Louis de Rougemont and the other players. I would watch it every single night even if I didn’t have to housemanage and I just fell in love with the show.”

Based on a true story, part of the  magic of “Shipwrecked” is that the themes are timeless, Raffel said. “Our need as a society to build heroes only so we can knock them down is as old as time. At the end of the play, you will have your own opinion on what is truth and what is embellished in the story, and that is how it should be.”

The show isn’t a musical but there is a sea shanty.

Raffel, who joined CCP in 1997, moved with her family to Carmel when she was in the third grade and finished high school and college here. She has a degree in theater from Indiana University, and her focus has always been on directing. Although, she has stage-managed, costumed, set designed, sound designed and even a little acting at the Phoenix Theatre, Theatre on the Square, Fringe Theater and more. She has directed productions at several professional, semi professional and community theaters around Central Indiana. She is the current president of Carmel Community Players’ board of directors and has been the artistic director on and off for a few years. She loves reading scripts and directing plays. But, she said, “As I get older, they have to be the right thing. I like it to be my choice.”

Contact Betsy Reason at betsy@thetimes24-7.com