The production runs through July 6 at Camelot Theatre

By Lucie K. Scheuer for Ashland.news

You might say that domestic, comedic dramatist and playwright Del Shores’ successful life as a writer for stage, film and TV is the result of a series of crazy mishaps, which led to Shores becoming one of America’s funniest theater writers and strongest advocates for emerging LGBTQ+ writers.

His determination and desire to write in spite of seeming setbacks has also contributed to his philosophy: “Today I see that sometimes your curses become your blessings.”

Shores is in town for a short visit to wax nostalgic with his old friend, Gwen Overland, artistic director of the Camelot Theatre (they sort of started out together) and to celebrate the opening of his play, (which Overland enthusiastically added to this season’s lineup) “Daddy’s Dyin’… Who’s Got the Will?,” which runs through July 6. Shores will also conduct a free acting and audition workshop on Saturday, July 14, and will be on stage for the June 15 matinee to discuss the show and his career with Overland.  

First staged in 1987, “Daddy’s Dyin’” became so successful it was eventually made into a movie starring Beau Bridges, Beverly D’Angelo and Judge Reinhold. Like Shores’ “Sordid Lives,” which has become a bit of a cult classic — especially in the LGBTQ+ community — “Daddy’s Dyin’” is based on an assortment of hilarious southern characters that just happen to be patterned after lovable but irascible characters in his own family.

From “Days of Our Lives” to “Cheatin'”

Today, we’re not meeting in the rectory of the local Baptist church, a Texas honkytonk, or even in the living room of one of Shores’ somewhat crazy, chain-smoking characters, or at an aunt’s, devouring plates of fried chicken. We’re actually in a meeting room at the Camelot. Nevertheless, there’s a lot going on in here.

Shores recounts how his career began. He was 26 in 1984 playing a bartender on “Days of Our Lives,” with lines like “Here’s your drink Calliope… phone call – Roman.” Then one day, a scene was written for him. Unfortunately, due to time constraints, it had to be cut. The director complimented his acting, though, and said he was sorry but “this is just the way daytime works.”

“I went home, and I thought of all the people I wanted to work with, and I’d been doing all of these showcases,” he says, “So I wrote a play called “Cheatin’.”  While I was doing that play, my grandfather, my papa (pronounced paw paw) was having these progressive strokes, and I would come in and tell (my theater cohort) about my crazy family.”

Knowing papa was probably going to die soon, family members had begun to bicker over the will, but no one could find it.

“Then my Aunt Rita started accusing my mother of trying to mercy kill my papa…she was so scared he was going to change it!” he recalls.

After hearing his stories, the director of his play, “Cheatin’”, Sherry Landrum,  said “Del – that’s your next play,” and Shores started writing “Daddy’s Dyin’  Who’s Got the Will?”, which was the second of a trilogy he wrote, inspired by Preston Jones, an American playwright who died in 1979, also known for his Texas trilogy. The last in Shores’ trilogy is “Daughters of the Lone Star State,” which explores themes of racial and social tension in a small Texas town.

But back to the story.  

A new voice in theater — and in film

According to Shores, stage critic Ray Loynd on the LA Times reviewed “Daddy’s Dyin’” and basically wrote “There’s a new voice in theater.”

Shores says, “I always say, there’s that moment when it could have gone differently, if someone else had been assigned to review.”

Those words placed Shores on a trajectory to success that “changed the course of my life,” he says.

The play ran for 22 months and caught the attention of “Family Ties” creator Gary David Goldberg, who waited for him in the lobby and asked him to write an episode. That’s when the 1988 Writer’s Guild’s strike began and another one of those serendipitous things that could have been negative happened to Shores again.

Shores explains in an LA Times interview with Ray Loynd, who writes: “’Daddy’s Dyin’’ also serves as playwright Del Shores’ ticket to the ranks of writers in Hollywood who make money. The Texas native, 32, who roared into town 10 years ago in a battered Mustang to become an actor, landed a writing job with Warners TV after the success of his play. Then, during the ’88 Writers Guild strike, ‘with nothing better to do, I sat down with my laptop word processor and turned my play into a movie script.’”

“I was lucky,” Shores tells Loynd “because things came together. My manager (Bobbie Edrick) went to work packaging a low-budget deal with some name performers and Propaganda Films (a major music video producer) agreed to shoot the movie because they wanted to work with the director. And once the film was made, MGM — they ironically had earlier turned down the chance to produce it — bought it as a negative pickup with the strong support of (MGM production president) John Goldwyn.”

“His characters speak the truth”

Shores looks across the table at Overland, (who is highly degreed and multi-talented in her own right) with a grateful smile.

Ironically, they met in a church in West Hollywood, she the church pianist, both of them eventually moving on to more fulfilling callings.

The two have always lifted each other up.

Overland says, “Del got me involved in the actors’ community. He helped me get auditions.”  

Later Overland moved to Seattle, became involved in the Pioneer Square Theater and was instrumental in getting the company to produce “Daddy’s Dyin’s’” as an equity production. She is intimately familiar with Shores’ work, having played the preacher’s wife, the sister Lurlene, and now 37 years later, is playing the grandmother in the Camelot production.

“I really think, comedically, it’s a piece of genius,” she beams. “His characters speak the truth.”

Shores’ other pride and joy is his Del Shores Foundation.

“We literally started it right before the pandemic. We facilitate in finding LGBTQ+ storytellers in the south. We have a playwriting contest, a short film contest and a screenwriting contest,” Shores says, adding the foundation offers grants in the range of $10,000. “We really have been able to give these playwrights, these storytellers, an opportunity that they would never have.”

After the foundation’s launch at the start of the pandemic, Shores also gathered the cast of “Sordid Lives” together  and “we raised $90,000 and distributed that to all the theater partners.”

Shores and Overland look forward to greeting you when the relatives in “Daddy’s Dyin'” — Lurlene, Sara Lee, Orville, Evalita (and others) — come together to sort out Buford Turnover’s will. All the elements are present for this uproarious revival, giving new meaning to the phrase. Ya’ll come back now, ya here!”

Reach Ashland-based writer Lucie K. Scheuer at [email protected].