Theater Talk with Bradlee and Marci Bing

Theatre Three actors run through lines and card game

By Rita J. Egan

A husband and wife are about to take on a 90-minute game of gin rummy in front of a live audience.

Theatre Three veterans Bradlee and Marci Bing, who have been married for nearly 40 years, will star in the Port Jefferson theater’s production of The Gin Game. The Pulitzer Prize-winning play opens Saturday, Jan. 13.

Bradlee Bing, as Weller Martin, and Marci Bing, as Fonsia Dorsey, will transform from a happily married couple to two nursing home residents who strike up an acquaintance over a game of gin rummy.

Through the decades, on stage and television, the characters have been portrayed by iconic actors, such as husband and wife Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy, Cicely Tyson and James Earl Jones, and Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore.

The production is not the first time the Bings have acted together as they starred in the theater’s production of Past Tense in 1986.

In a recent interview with the couple, Bradlee Bing described The Gin Game as multi-layered and intricate, where the characters need each other. “But they have so many personal obstacles that they personally have to overcome that they can’t really connect,” he said.

The actors said it’s not difficult playing people meeting for the first time as they understand they are the characters while on stage. However, they said their relationship helps.

“We have natural chemistry,” said Bradlee. “So, we can connect with each other in a way that is comfortable. Even though there are many uncomfortable moments in the play, we’re those characters, and we’re not ourselves.”

The actors said their personalities are opposite of Weller Martin and Fonsia Dorsey.

“He’s patient and kind, and I’m the one who curses and gets fired up,” said Marci.

Bradlee added, “It’s the exact opposite of who we are, but we can laugh about it because we kind of changed roles that we have in real life.”

It’s because of Theatre Three that the two met. Bradlee Bing has been with the company since 1970, guiding the actors from a traveling troop who once performed in storefronts, libraries and church basements to its permanent stage in Port Jefferson. The couple met when Marci joined the acting troop, going on to become part of the theater’s 1979 inaugural theater season as one of six contracted summer company members.

Marci also worked in the theater’s office and assisted her now husband on many projects. When Bradlee was battling cancer and going through a divorce, he needed someone to talk to and asked Marci to go for coffee as he knew she had gone through a divorce years before. They struck up a friendship but still weren’t thinking about romance. However, one night, some theater members went out for drinks and dancing after a show. Someone suggested Bradlee dance with Marci. As he danced with her, he said to himself, “Wait a minute. It’s exactly how you see it in movies. Wow, I never knew that was around.”

While the two said they never argue, the characters they play in The Gin Game do. The Bings added they have plenty of time to master the tense interactions between Weller and Fonsia.

Marci, who is the only one of the pair who has played gin rummy before, said, “It’s a two-character, so it’s an intense amount of practicing of just all the lines. But what’s even more intricate is you have to play the game while you’re thinking of the lines and remembering all the segments. So, our advantage is we live together. It’s 10 o’clock. ‘You want to run scene to see how we’re doing?’”

While Bradlee saw the play performed before at Theatre Three when he was the artistic director, to prepare, the couple have not watched videos of other productions or the 2003 PBS movie, where Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore took on the roles.

“I have to make my own character so I don’t want to watch someone else doing it,” Marci said, adding it was different when she played movie star Betty Davis in Me and Jezebel,  where she had to master the icon’s physicalities.

“We bring our own personal experiences that will help us connect with the character and that is much more honest than trying to imitate anyone,” Bradlee said.

Colleen Britt is directing Theatre Three’s The Gin Game. Bradlee said Britt expresses “tremendous energy” and has helped in the development of the characters. 

The actors said while the play contains a lot of humor, it also includes a message about growing old and how some may feel that life is passing them by. The acting duo hopes that audience members will leave The Gin Game thinking about aging and possibly having a more positive attitude toward getting older. Marci added that, for some, getting old can be devastating. 

“It’s sad because you can’t do as much as you want to do,” she said.

Her advice is to “be current.”

“Don’t wallow in what didn’t happen,” she said. “Be glad that you’re still here.”

Bradlee said, often, it can be difficult for people as they look back at their lives, ambitions and goals.

“You reach a point where you realize that there’s no more time to achieve those kinds of goals,” he said. “So, if you live in the past, and see where you are, it’s going to be unfortunate. It’s a good example in the play that you need to move forward.”

Theatre Three, 412 Main Street, Port Jefferson, presents The Gin Game from Jan. 13 to Feb. 3. Tickets are $40 for adults, $32 for seniors 65 and over and students and $25 for children. Wednesday matinees are $25. For more information, call the box office at 631-928-9100 or visit www.theatrethree.com.