Steel Magnolias

Synopsis
Set entirely in a beauty salon in small-town Louisiana, Steel Magnolias offers a window into six women’s lives as they navigate weddings, babies, heartbreaks and healing. At its centre is Shelby, a beautiful young woman and her strong-willed mother M’Lynn. As Shelby makes life-changing decisions, M’Lynn finds it difficult to sit by as her daughter leaves the nest.

The play unfolds across four separate days, over three years, at the salon.  It begins on young hair dressing apprentice Annelle’s first day (which also happens to be Shelby’s wedding day).  This is followed by a lively Christmas gathering and then a reunion a couple of years later, marked by life-changing news, and finally, a crisp autumn morning when the air is colder, the stakes are higher and the bonds between them feel stronger than ever.

Rounding out this cast of lovable characters is Truvy, the salt-of-the-earth owner of the beauty salon, Ouiser (the town’s cranky old lady who has been in ‘a bad mood for forty years’) and Miss Clairee, the widow of the ex-Mayor.

Directed by Alison Venning