Thursday, October 1, 2026
The laughter and nostalgia of classic television will take center stage in Glen Cove this November when the Slayer Players Theatre Company performs Classic TV Live! Lucy Is “With Child” at the North Country Reform Temple, 86 Crescent Beach Road. Performances are scheduled for November 8, 9, 15 and 16 and will serve as a fundraiser for the temple. Tickets for the dinner-and-show are $75 per guest, the brunch-and-show is $65, and show-only admission is $25.
The Slayer Players Theatre Company was founded in November 2016 with the goal of bringing “murder, mystery and mayhem” to local audiences. The group’s founder contacted actor Fred DiMenna, who became the troupe’s manager and treasurer. Their first show, Murder at the Banquet, debuted on April Fool’s Day 2017 at the View Grill in Glen Cove. The response was so strong that a third performance had to be added. Since then, the troupe has performed throughout the North Shore, including at the Sea Cliff Yacht Club, and has expanded to include holiday shows and nostalgic TV reenactments.
“We started as just a murder-mystery group, and now we’ve branched off,” DiMenna said. “We still do the murder mysteries, but we do custom-written ones where we write it specific for the venue. And then we also do holiday shows, like It’s a Wonderful Life last year and A Christmas Carol the year before.”
The cast features Christine Montick as Lucy Ricardo, Fred DiMenna as Ricky Ricardo, Donna Herman as Ethel Mertz, and Steven Frese as Fred Mertz. Additional performers include Dawn Edison, Gail Carlin, Tanya Panasayuk, Mariana Rosas, John Robinson, Rob Cammarata, Bruce Chalnick, Richard Biondi, Warren Koedding, Paul Tuthill, Jeanine DiMenna, and Peter Budraitis. Edison is also responsible for costumes, many of which are sourced from local yard sales and donations to recreate the fashion of the 1950s.
The company’s “Classic TV Live!” series began as a way to celebrate the golden age of television. Past productions have included The Honeymooners and The Twilight Zone, which became audience favorites. “These are shows from the golden era of TV that people our age are really fond of,” DiMenna said. “When we were kids, we were watching stuff that was 25 years old like it was still new. We didn’t realize how old it was.”
This season’s choice, I Love Lucy, had long been on the group’s wish list. “We’ve done The Honeymooners and Twilight Zone. This time we decided to do I Love Lucy, and it’s been requested previously, but we never had the people in place,” DiMenna explained. “Now we have the perfect cast for it because we have, number one, we have Lucy — which is the key.”
That Lucy is played by Christine Montick, who joined the troupe after first participating as a planted audience member during one of the group’s interactive mysteries. The production also stars Donna Herman as Ethel Mertz, Steven Frese as Fred Mertz, and DiMenna himself as Ricky Ricardo.
The group will perform two episodes from I Love Lucy’s groundbreaking second season: Ricky Has Labor Pains and Lucy Goes to the Hospital. The storylines mirror Lucille Ball’s real-life pregnancy, which was written into the show despite strong objections from the network’s sponsors at the time. “Pregnancy was a dirty word in those days,” DiMenna said. “People didn’t get pregnant — you couldn’t say the word on TV. They had to use ‘with child’ or something like that.”
DiMenna explained that Desi Arnaz fought to keep the storyline, convincing sponsors that audiences would embrace it. His instincts proved right. “70 percent of America watched that show,” DiMenna said. “Eisenhower’s inauguration the next day actually had lower ratings. More people watched Lucy being pregnant than the president being inaugurated.”
The Slayer Players’ 90-minute production will re-create the charm of 1950s television, complete with projected commercials from the era and a video presentation narrated by John Canning. The video will include clips from Lucy Is Enceinte, the episode where Lucy reveals her pregnancy using the Spanish word “enceinte” to avoid censorship.
Dawn Edison, who oversees costumes, has helped assemble the 1950s wardrobe on a limited budget by hunting for pieces at local yard sales. DiMenna credited her attention to detail for helping the production come to life. “She’s been responsible for picking up a lot of this stuff,” he said. “We’re on a limited budget, but we’re trying to put a good set together.”
The Classic TV Live! series has become one of the troupe’s most anticipated traditions, offering audiences both nostalgia and laughter while supporting community causes. DiMenna said the collaboration among cast members is what makes each show memorable. “I don’t consider myself the director, but I am,” he said with a laugh. “I consider us all to be directors because everybody’s chipping in — and that’s what makes it so much fun.”
The performance promises to combine humor, history, and heart, revisiting a defining moment in television when Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz changed what was possible on screen. For ticket reservations or more information, contact the North Country Reform Temple.
