Wesley Savick has adapted two short stories by Truman Capote and Grace Paley and will be directing them as one-act plays in Tru Grace: Holiday Memoirs at the Central Square Theater in Cambridge.

These professional productions – Capote’s A Christmas Memory and Paley’s The Loudest Voice – target family audiences and will run from Nov. 19 through Dec. 27, 2009.

The stories, told from the point of view of children and set in the 1930s, are joyful, whimsical, and rich with humor.

In A Christmas Memory, Capote recalls his close friendship with another social outcast, his wildly eccentric older cousin, and the enduring spirit for life they shared.

The Loudest Voice is an adaptation of a Paley story about immigrant Jews living in Brooklyn and the complications that ensue when their children are cast in the local school’s Christmas pageant.

Savick, an associate professor in the Theatre Department, crafts the perfect holiday alternative with an intergenerational cast, puppetry, music, and even fruitcakes.

The University has additional ties to this production:
• Cathy Carr-Kelley, executive director of the Central Square Theater, earned her MBA from the Sawyer Business School.
• Central Square theater staff member Amy Leigh Frizzi is an alumna.
• Theatre Department General Manager Jim Kaufman is a Central Square Theater board member.
• Kaufman’s daughter, Sofia, 11, plays the title role in The Loudest Voice.