Something special happened in Middlebury last weekend.
Folks in Buttolph Acres and at EastView were drawn out of their homes and into the streets by an old-fashioned traveling show. Created by Town Hall Theater’s Courageous Stage and performed on a mobile platform, “Doc Lyle Sol’s Medicine Show” encouraged pan-banging, music-playing, and cheering from audiences — who were appropriately spaced out and masked — along its route.
The original work is a modern twist on the 1800s medicine show, as Doc Sol, a classic “snake-oil salesman,” pulls out all the stops to sell the crowd a miracle cure for every COVID-inflicted ill — isolation, frustration, even… constipation? Conceived and written by Lindsay Pontius, Craig Maravich, Clint Bierman and Bair Lambert, the show culminated in a singalong with the audience.
It wasn’t a miracle cure, but it certainly lightened the mood for the dozens who came out of isolation to enjoy it.