The Demon Child

There’s just something so lovable about maniacal children. Especially the sweet, murderous ones like Rhoda Penmark (Campbell Coughlin) in the Sherman Players’ production of Maxwell Anderson’s “The Bad Seed.” The play first introduces us to Rhoda as a practically-perfect-in-every-way 8-year-old who is neat as a pin, astonishingly polite and overwhelmingly smart. But alas, this could not last for long. We soon discover that Rhoda has not received a precious penmanship prize, losing it to another student, Claude. When the prize is brought up by a family friend, the doting Freudian Monica Breedlove (Katherine Almquist), another side of Rhoda’s personality emerges: a ruthless, indomitable Rhoda who will do anything to be on top. Tension builds and suspicions arise when Claude turns up dead at a school picnic. Rhoda returns home from this picnic happy as a clam, not affected at all by her schoolmate’s demise. It becomes obvious to the audience at this point what has happened. The play continues to reveal more and more about Rhoda’s psyche, with help from her probing mother, Christine (Vicki J. Sosbe), who is increasingly aware of a dark secret in her own past. “The Bad Seed” is a dramatic thriller that enters the eerie realm of the psychopath. It gives its own definitive answer to the “nature versus nurture” question and invites everyone to look into their own psyches. “The Bad Seed” runs at the Sherman Playhouse on Friday and Saturday evenings at 8 p.m. and some Sundays at 2 p.m., through May 14. Tickets are $20.

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