Read Online Almost Midnight by Michael W. Cuneo - Free Book Online
Authors: Michael W. Cuneo
Ads: Link
townsfolk didn’t want heathen of their sort showing their faces in the Spokane school gym again.
I N THE SPRING of 1983 Darrell’s cousin Joe Dean heard that the Shepherd of the Hills, an outdoor theater in Branson, was hiring new cast members. He suggested that the two of them drive down and see about signing on. Darrell figured he had nothing to lose.
Keith Thurman, the director of Shepherd of the Hills, was looking for extras to flesh out the scenery, real-lifers, guys who could more or less play themselves as authentic hillbillies. Darrell and Joe Dean were about as authentic as could be, but Thurman needed some convincing that they were the right men for the job.
“I guess I was particularly concerned about Darrell,” he recalled. “I didn’t know Darrell from Adam but the Mease boys from up around Reeds Spring had a reputation as being bad dudes, real ornery bastards. So at first I was a bit leery of Darrell. I thought we might have trouble with him. But I sat down and talked with him for ten or fifteen minutes, and then I knew for sure that we’d have no problems. He was as easygoing as anything, a real good guy. I liked him a lot right off.”
Joe Dean quit after a few rehearsals but Darrell stuck it out for almost two full seasons. He played a Bald Knobber, which consisted mostly of riding horseback onto the open-air set in a cloud of menace. He was perfect for the role—so perfect, in fact, that during his second season the company featured his picture on the front cover of its promotional brochures. It was quite a picture, Darrell wearing a black cowboy hat, overalls, and a faded orange-and-white shirt, and looking down the bores of a cracked-open, doublebarreled shotgun.
His second season was cut short when his horse bucked offstage, pinning him against a wall and fracturing his leg. The injury kept him from performing but not from whooping it up at the nightly cast parties. The parties were something to behold. When it came to letting their hair down, the Shepherd of the Hills folks took a backseat to no one. They’d close the bars in Branson as a warm-up and then really let loose at Big Rock on Bull Creek, a picnic and swimming spot near Walnut Shade. One night on the creek, the liquor flowing, someone started shooting off some powerful firecrackers, taking just about everybody by surprise. Keith Thurman remembers almost jumping out of his skin when the first firecracker went off and then finding Darrell huddled on the ground next to a pickup, screaming “Incoming! Incoming! Incoming!”
It was at one of these late-night boozefests on Bull Creek thatDarrell met Donna May. A large, attractive woman, about six feet and almost two hundred pounds, with bright eyes, long brown hair, and sculptured features, Donna wasn’t difficult to pick out in a crowd. She inherited her size from her father, Bill, a giant of a man and a notorious quick-buck schemer, and her good looks from her mother, Jeanie, a sweet and elegant woman who played bass in a local swing combo. She’d come to the party with several friends from the cast but spent most of the night hanging out with Darrell. They hit it off pretty well, both of them big drinkers and big talkers, and before the week was through Donna had moved into Darrell’s house in the hollow. A year later their daughter, Amanda, was born, and a second child, Tyler, was on the way by the time they finally got around to tying the knot.
Darrell’s sister, Rita, who was married by this point and living in Michigan, remembers the wedding as a happy and hopeful occasion. “I’d been away for a while and kind of lost touch with my brother. I didn’t really know Donna. She was a big woman, about ten years younger than Darrell, and really quite pretty. They got married on Halloween and the reception was in a big cave with a beautiful bonfire. They seemed really happy—almost shining.”
It didn’t take long for the shine to wear off. A month or so after the wedding
I N THE SPRING of 1983 Darrell’s cousin Joe Dean heard that the Shepherd of the Hills, an outdoor theater in Branson, was hiring new cast members. He suggested that the two of them drive down and see about signing on. Darrell figured he had nothing to lose.
Keith Thurman, the director of Shepherd of the Hills, was looking for extras to flesh out the scenery, real-lifers, guys who could more or less play themselves as authentic hillbillies. Darrell and Joe Dean were about as authentic as could be, but Thurman needed some convincing that they were the right men for the job.
“I guess I was particularly concerned about Darrell,” he recalled. “I didn’t know Darrell from Adam but the Mease boys from up around Reeds Spring had a reputation as being bad dudes, real ornery bastards. So at first I was a bit leery of Darrell. I thought we might have trouble with him. But I sat down and talked with him for ten or fifteen minutes, and then I knew for sure that we’d have no problems. He was as easygoing as anything, a real good guy. I liked him a lot right off.”
Joe Dean quit after a few rehearsals but Darrell stuck it out for almost two full seasons. He played a Bald Knobber, which consisted mostly of riding horseback onto the open-air set in a cloud of menace. He was perfect for the role—so perfect, in fact, that during his second season the company featured his picture on the front cover of its promotional brochures. It was quite a picture, Darrell wearing a black cowboy hat, overalls, and a faded orange-and-white shirt, and looking down the bores of a cracked-open, doublebarreled shotgun.
His second season was cut short when his horse bucked offstage, pinning him against a wall and fracturing his leg. The injury kept him from performing but not from whooping it up at the nightly cast parties. The parties were something to behold. When it came to letting their hair down, the Shepherd of the Hills folks took a backseat to no one. They’d close the bars in Branson as a warm-up and then really let loose at Big Rock on Bull Creek, a picnic and swimming spot near Walnut Shade. One night on the creek, the liquor flowing, someone started shooting off some powerful firecrackers, taking just about everybody by surprise. Keith Thurman remembers almost jumping out of his skin when the first firecracker went off and then finding Darrell huddled on the ground next to a pickup, screaming “Incoming! Incoming! Incoming!”
It was at one of these late-night boozefests on Bull Creek thatDarrell met Donna May. A large, attractive woman, about six feet and almost two hundred pounds, with bright eyes, long brown hair, and sculptured features, Donna wasn’t difficult to pick out in a crowd. She inherited her size from her father, Bill, a giant of a man and a notorious quick-buck schemer, and her good looks from her mother, Jeanie, a sweet and elegant woman who played bass in a local swing combo. She’d come to the party with several friends from the cast but spent most of the night hanging out with Darrell. They hit it off pretty well, both of them big drinkers and big talkers, and before the week was through Donna had moved into Darrell’s house in the hollow. A year later their daughter, Amanda, was born, and a second child, Tyler, was on the way by the time they finally got around to tying the knot.
Darrell’s sister, Rita, who was married by this point and living in Michigan, remembers the wedding as a happy and hopeful occasion. “I’d been away for a while and kind of lost touch with my brother. I didn’t really know Donna. She was a big woman, about ten years younger than Darrell, and really quite pretty. They got married on Halloween and the reception was in a big cave with a beautiful bonfire. They seemed really happy—almost shining.”
It didn’t take long for the shine to wear off. A month or so after the wedding
Similar Books
