Lincoln actress bringing country legend Patsy Cline to the stage

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By JEFF KORBELIK / GZO

Ask Kyttra Burge her favorite Patsy Cline song, and you’ll find she’s tough to pin down.

“It changes all the time,” the Lincoln actress said. “‘Walking After Midnight,’ ‘Three Cigarettes in an Ash Tray’ … ‘Sweet Dreams’ is awesome. Today it’s ‘Love Sick Blues,’  but it’ll probably change tomorrow.”

Basically, she loves them all and enjoys singing them just as much.

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Kyttra Burge (Back) portrays Patsy Cline while Cris Rook stars as Cline’s friend Louise Seger in the musical play "Always â€- Patsy Cline," which will begin Thursday at TADA Theatre. (Courtesy photo)

Kyttra Burge (Back) portrays Patsy Cline while Cris Rook stars as Cline’s friend Louise Seger in the musical play "Always â€- Patsy Cline," which will begin Thursday at TADA Theatre. (Courtesy photo)

“Her music is dreamy, sort of haunting and wonderful,” Burge said. “It sticks with you.”

And hopefully with her audiences.

Burge plays the country music legend in the musical play “Always … Patsy Cline,” which opens Thursday at the TADA Theatre in the Creamery Building.

Created by Ted Swindley, “Always … Patsy Cline” is based on the true story of Cline’s relationship with Houston housewife Louise Seger, who befriended the star in a Texas honky-tonk in 1961, and continued a correspondence with Cline until her untimely death in a plane crash at the age of 30.

Robert D. Rook is directing, with his wife, Cris, handling music direction and playing Seger.

Swindley, who has directed and produced more than 200 plays in his career, created the musical in 1988 in Houston, where he was the founding artistic director of Stages Repertory Theatre.

He decided against a revue or a biographical epic in favor of the two-woman musical play after discovering an interview with Seger in a Cline biography. What intrigued him was a letter that Cline wrote to Seger. According to Swindley, the warmth and humanity of Cline’s letter provided an avenue to tell the singer’s story and the effect she had on her fans.

“(The play) pays homage to her and introduces her to today’s audiences,” Robert Rook said. “People who like LeAnn Rimes — someone who has covered Patsy’s songs before — may like this, too.”

Swindley’s play initially was 45 minutes long, but he reworked the script in 1990 for a theater in South Carolina, converting it into what is now its full-length version.

The script, complete with down-home country humor, true emotion and even some audience participation, includes many of Cline’s hits, such as “Crazy,” “I Fall to Pieces,” “Sweet Dreams” and “Walking After Midnight.”

Burge, 37, will make her Lincoln debut with the Cline musical. She worked professionally in Wichita, Kan., where she graduated from college, for eight years before taking time off to start a family.

Her husband is David Burge, who is known locally as the bow-tie guy. A University of Nebraska-Lincoln employee, David Burge made news in the spring of 2007  when he competed to become a guest host on NBC’s “The Today Show.” He now appears in online videos at JournalStar.com.

For Kyttra Burge, the musical will be her first stage performance in three years.

“I’m loving it,” she said. “I thought I would be really nervous, but TADA has been very gentle with me. They’ve been so encouraging and so helpful. I can’t say enough about that.”

Robert Rook was just as complimentary.

“You know you’re lucky when someone walks through the door who looks like Kyttra and sounds like that,” he said. “When you’re casting the lead role, you want to make sure you’re on target.”

It helps that Burge knows the musical well. While in Wichita, she “dressed” the show, meaning she helped her friend, actress Cindy Summers, with her costumes during the musical’s nine-month run.

“I always hoped one day to play the role myself,” she said, noting she’s been e-mailing Summers, who currently is playing Cline in a production in  Texas.

And now she is.

Reach Jeff Korbelik at 473-7213 or jkorbelik@journalstar.com.