Grace and Glorie Now Playing at Island Players

ANNA MARIA — The odd couple comedy, Grace and Glorie, is currently running at the Island Players Theater on Anna Maria Island.  Set in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, it tells the story of two very different women who build an unlikely friendship.

Grace, a feisty 90-year-old cancer patient, has checked herself out of the hospital and returned to her beloved homestead cottage to die alone. Her volunteer hospice worker, Glorie, is a Harvard MBA recently transplanted to this rural backwater from New York.

Glorie is tense, unhappy and guilt-ridden, her only child having been killed in an auto accident when she was driving. As she attempts to care for and comfort the cantankerous Grace, the sophisticated Glorie gains new perspectives on values and life's highs and lows.

Tom Ziegler's comedy was first produced at Theatre Virginia in Richmond in the spring of 1991. It was later adapted to the screen as part of the Hallmark Hall of Fame series on CBS, starring Gena Rowlands and Diane Lane. The New York Times called it "A sentimental odd couple crowd pleaser...[with] a steady drip of easy laughs."

Directed by James Thaggard, Grace and Glorie runs through May 18. Visit the Island Players website for schedule and ticket information.