You probably know Larry Springer as a playwright, raconteur, musician, band leader, principal, librarian and all around good fellow.
On February 12 at 2 pm at the Ice House in Berkeley Springs, Springer will give a talk about his life as a trumpet player at the infamous strip club in Baltimore in the 1950’s.
Springer has written two plays that will be performed at the Ice House February 16 to 19 and February 23 to 26.
At his talk on February 12, Larry will fill in the details of life as a musician in a famous Baltimore strip club. Refreshments will be served.
One play — Take It Off — is set in a 1940s Baltimore strip club.
“This is autobiographical,” says Springer. “I was a 20-something kid studying at Peabody and wanted a gig playing my trumpet.”
Springer was looking to play in a big band, but wound up at a strip club as a fill-in one night.
While the setting and some of the language are rough, the characters “are real people like you and me — they’re just trying to make a living and doing the best they can,” Springer said.
The play contains some exotic dancing, but promises no nudity.
“This will be very tastefully done,” says Tom Brooks.
“Nudity is not the point: it’s the lives of these people that are fascinating.”
The second play — Take My Demon…Please! — a boring, humorless man becomes possessed by the spirit of a comic.
The play is along the lines of The Exorcist but with a twist.
As one of the characters observes, “When someone is possessed by a devil, you call a priest.When someone is possessed by a comic, you call an agent.”