In Town

When San Francisco playwright Nathan Sanders comes to Fort Myers for the opening night of his comedy The Sugar Bean Sisters (onstage at Florida Repertory Theatre May 27-June 19; call 332-4488), it will be a homecoming of sorts. Sanders spent most of his formative years in Florida, including one near Okeechobee, not far from where his play about the old-maid daughters of a convicted mass murderer is set. The off-Broadway production of Sugar Bean a decade ago won him critical praise; a new production in Los Angeles is also coming up in the fall.

Q. I know The Sugar Bean Sisters is fiction, but is there a little bit of truth in it?

A. My aunts and my grandmother were unusual, colorful characters-Florida pioneers who were also Mormons. They told a lot of tall tales, as did my step-grandfather. When we were little, he used to swear that he had a cousin living in the Central Florida swamps who'd given birth to a litter of puppies. So there's definitely some of that "write what you know" thing at work here.

Q. Why become a playwright, as opposed to some other form of writing?

A. Growing up, I'd never seen a live play, but TV was our window on the world. A television version of Thornton Wilder's Our Town was the first play I ever saw. After that, I started writing little plays for my sister and me that we performed out by the clothesline. Later, working as an actor in New York, I started writing again and just fell in love with it, so much more so than acting, where I felt like I was being forced to paint with someone else's colors.

Q. You've done some revisions to the play for this production?

A. Bari [director Bari Newport] sent me some ideas, and I came up with ways to strengthen the play and freshen it for me. She's very whimsical, with a lot of energy, and we're using a lot of physical comedy. Also, I'm using these changes for the screenplay.

Q. Any idea of who might star in that?

A. We've gotten the script to Lily Tomlin, Dixie Carter, Christine Lahti and, believe it or not, Julie Andrews and Carol Burnett. They've wanted to do a project together for a long time, and the way we play the sisters, they can range in age anywhere from the 40s to the 80s.

Q. How would you describe the style of the piece?

A. People have definitely called it wacky-a Southern swamp version of Arsenic and Old Lace. We're using rather cinematic special effects in it, as, for example, when a UFO comes onstage; kids really love that. I always see the play as sort of a folk tale or legend. There's a lot that's tragic in the sisters' lives; they're scarred by their childhoods. But my characters laugh in the face of tragedy. Because what other choice do you have, especially in the South?

-Kay Kipling