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“font-family: Verdana;”>A Spoonful of Honey is one of the most unlikely names of a theater company, ever. But for Lisa Harris, the moniker was a no-brainer.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“Honey has been healing medicine for me,” said Harris, founder and artistic director for the all new Spoonful of Honey Theatre. “And theater is supposed to provide healing with the show.”
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>In 2005, she had a sinus infection and an allergic reaction to medication that resulted in a bacterial infection in her blood. She lost 30 pounds in one month. After attempts to treat her condition with a barrage of medications, she was as sick as she had ever been.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“I said, ‘I’m tired. I’m not taking another pill.’”
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>After doing internet research, she found Manuka Honey. “I put a spoonful on a piece of bread or in my tea,” she said, “and I haven’t been sick since.”
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>She is hoping to offer a remedy through the arts with her new theater company named in tribute of her own healing. It makes its theatrical debut on Friday, Aug. 26 with Pearl Bailey…By Request at the Missouri History Museum.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>The production pays tribute to the late singer/actress/comedienne and stars her good friends, husband and wife acting team Gary Vincent and Roz Gonsalvez White-Vincent.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“I’ve been really good friends with Roz and Gary since we did the first Tell Me Something Good at the Black Rep back in 1997,” Harris said.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“I believe so much in Roz. I know her singing, and I know that she and Gary are just phenomenal together. Roz is Pearl Bailey while telling her story in between the songs, with these wonderful punchlines while singing the songs. She interacts with the audience and the band. It’s really fun. This is the perfect show for my first season.”
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Harris is an accomplished singer and actress in her own right. She enjoyed an extended run as a three-time winner of the legendary Showtime at the Apollo’s Amateur Night, where her lone backstage request was – you guessed it – a spoonful of honey.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“It would coat my throat, and I would go on to win,” Harris said.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>She said it was through her healing that her true purpose was revealed.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“I felt like it was it was another chance and a lesson,” she said.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“You have something to offer, and you could have been taken out without sharing. I feel the responsibility. My main mission is to die empty. People out here are waiting and are hungry for the gift we have inside of us.”
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>The idea to form her own company began with a seed planted by another St. Louis theater’s artistic director.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“Deanna Jent, who is a professor at Fontbonne and director of Mustard Seed Theatre, had us become the artistic director of our own theater as a class project,” Harris said. “Spoonful of Honey went on to become my thesis.”
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Harris went on to teach drama at Jennings High School and fell in love with the process, but longed for more.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“I thought, ‘If I can’t invest in myself, then who will?’” Harris said.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>So she walked away from her teaching career and her singing and acting career to focus on her theater full-time.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“My thing is to push and to get all of those people who always wanted to perform,” Harris said.
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>“I want to create a new era of creativity in the area. Some of us can’t leave. That doesn’t mean we aren’t good . So I’ve always wanted to create something where we don’t have to leave.”
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“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>A Spoonful of Honey’s production of “font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana;”>Pearl Bailey…By Request will be presented on Friday, Aug. 26 at 8 p.m. at the Missouri History Museum, Lindell and DeBaliviere in Forest Park. For more information or to purchase tickets, visit www.aspoonfulohoney.com or call (877) 422-9529.
