All tickets, $35 all reserved.
World Premiere Tour
Oscar® Winner (On Golden Pond) Ernest Thompson’s Newest Play
In this powerful one-man performance, Ernest Thompson introduces a cast of characters as hilarious, imperfectly human and poignant as those in his most iconic work, the Academy-Award-winning play On Golden Pond, his three dozen other plays, ten films and two novels. Presented by Beyond the Barn Productions and The Park Theatre, this show will tug your heartstrings, make you think, and leave you inspired by the strength of the human soul.
A synopsis of ARCHIE PARISH’S PARTING WORDS by Ernest Thompson, Academy Award-winning author of On Golden Pond
Archie Parish, not young but youthful and only slightly broken, is asked to deliver a eulogy for a man he has sound reason to dislike, and tells the truth. An intoxicated mourner, suitably impressed, begs Archie to do the honors for the drunk’s wife, not completely deceased yet. Archie reluctantly agrees to visit the poor woman and is so affected by her poetic ramblings that he rises to the challenge. And then scans the paper for other dead strangers to eulogize.
This leads Archie’s eccentric therapist to question his odd obsession, and also to suggest that Archie visit his medical doctor who’s concerned enough by Archie’s shortness of breath and chronic cough to recommend immediate testing. Ever the opportunist, Archie consents, provided that the physician inform him which patients among the walking wounded in her waiting room are most likely to kick the bucket soon. More eulogies! More excitement in Archie’s barren life.
But, alas, the result is an alarming diagnosis. Archie has “Brugada” syndrome, which, left untreated, could kill him in a matter of months. To Archie, mired in despair and hopelessness, that doesn’t seem like such a bad idea. Not acceptable! Says his increasingly impatient shrink who demands that Archie come to terms with the harsh reality that when his beloved wife passed away, Archie couldn’t speak at her memorial and has been haunted ever since, feeling that he failed her, and has never achieved anything close to closure.
Archie met the love of his life in a college ballet class; she was a dancer, an artist, a better angel than Archie. Dance becomes a metaphor, and the deeper Archie digs to his psychological core, the more fluid his physical expression — an awkward soft-shoe here, a Martha Graham wheeling turn, a reckless grand jeté — until Archie starts to defy the gravity that’s held him down, and he dances, reconnecting with his lost wife through his inner Baryshnikov. The Bolshoi may not be calling but there’s a beauty to Archie’s emergence, proud and rebellious and ready at last to give his wife her fond farewell.
Audiences will find inspiration from the not young but youthful writer/actor/director and long-ago dancer, nearly Baryshnikov’s age, who fearlessly demonstrates that it really is possible in our lives, at any stage, to move (on).
ERNEST THOMPSON BIO
Ernest Thompson’s work has won an Academy Award, two Golden Globes, Writers Guild and Broadway Drama Guild Awards and been nominated for a Tony, an Emmy and a British Academy Award. His plays have been seen in theatres around the world, his most enduring, On Golden Pond, translated into 30 languages and presented in more than 40 countries. Current projects include an On Golden Pond Broadway revival, directed by and starring the author, true also of his new one-man play, Archie Parish’s Parting Words, now on tour in the Northeast, the short film The Constituent, and the long-awaited sequel, Home On Golden Pond. His novel Out Clause arrives on October 7th, 2025. With his writer wife Kerrin Thompson, he established Rescind Recidivism, a prison writing program giving inmates a chance to feel creative as well as human, capable and worthy.
Learn more at www.ErnestThompson.us.