Holiday Shenanigans At OnStage’s ‘New Family Gathering’

OnStage Playhouse stages the San Diego premiere of A Nice Family Gathering, a new comedy by Phil Olson. The show opens Oct. 16 and runs through Nov. 24 in Chula Vista.

A Nice Family Gathering is the story of a man who loved his wife so much, he almost told her. The Lundeen family of Minnesota gathers for Thanksgiving. It’s their first meeting since Dad’s funeral. A surprise guest arrives – dad’s ghost. Seems he can’t get into heaven until he communicates to mom how much he loved her.

However, dad is only able to speak to and be seen by his youngest son, Carl. Carl feels his father didn’t pay much attention to him in life, and is annoyed that he is haunting him now. But dad’s visit is the catalyst for revelations about each of the three Lundeen siblings, and in the end the family is finally communicating.

A Nice Family Gathering won the Rochester Playwright Festival, was a finalist in the The Robert J. Pickering Award for Playwriting Excellence, and The Phoenix Theatre’s Festival of Emerging American Theatre, and a semi-finalist in the Ukiah Players New Comedy Festival as well as the Chesterfield Writer’s Film Project.

A Nice Family Gathering
A San Diego premiere by OnStage Playhouse
Oct. 16-Nov. 24
Tickets: $15

Downtown Chula Vista Arts Center, 291 Third Ave. (in Chula Vista)
Box Office: (619) 422-7787
Online: www.onstageplayhouse.org