Editor’s Note: This story first appeared in Heart of Ohio magazine. It is being republished in a collaborative effort with Richland Source.com.
Mark Sebastian Jordan is adamant about the fact that he did not choose writing as a career … writing chose him. The author of the Mansfield Trilogy, Ceely, Phoebe, and Louie, was inspired by his love of history and Malabar Farm as well as a business career that left him unsatisfied.
In 1995, Mark read a book, Haunted Ohio, on local folk lore that included an abbreviated version of the Ceely Rose story. Intrigued, he spent hours poring over newspaper accounts in the John Sherman room at the Mansfield/Richland County Public Library. He realized that even Bromfield’s own version of the story in his novel, Pleasant Valley, included more fiction than fact. The much more interesting truth of the story inspired him to see it on stage, and that summer he wrote Ceely.
As is often the case, Mark’s business career took precedence and he was forced to put the play’s production on the back burner. Not until 2001, when a friend, Dan Feiertag, encouraged him to develop the work, did the play become important to him once again. Mark approached then park manager, Louie Andres, about producing and staging Ceely at Malabar Farm. The barn at Malabar provided the perfect setting to present the play, and the farm’s historical tie with the story made it come alive. In 2003, Mark produced the play in conjunction with the Mansfield Playhouse and Feiertag. As technical director, Feiertag was responsible for converting the barn into a temporary theater, a role which the technical wiz has repeated in every Malabar show since.
Candy Boyd is the young actress who portrayed Ceely. Mark says, “She couldn’t have been more dedicated to the part. She brought Ceely to life on the stage.”
As part of the research, Mark and Candy visited Lima State Hospital, where Ceely is buried. “It is all part of ‘absorbing’ the character,” says Jordan. In later revivals, the part was played by Rhiannon Evans, who explored different aspects of the troubled girl, proving that the play could handle a range of different interpretations.
Mark originally felt Ceely was to be a stand-alone. However, being a “just-in-case” thinker, he dropped a line in the play about Phoebe Wise to set up the possibility of a second story.
“If there are two ghost stories in the area that are famous, it is Phoebe and Ceely. I was intrigued by both,” Mark said.
By the time Ceely had been presented at Malabar in 2003 and 2004, Mark had completed Phoebe, with the research help of Malabar Farm naturalist and local historian, Brett Mitchell, who has contributed to the author’s research on all three historical dramas. Phoebe took the stage in 2005 and 2006, with Dorothy Duckworth as the older Phoebe, and Chevy Troxell portraying the middle years. Audiences grew, as many people who had seen Ceely returned for the second play, bringing their friends with them.
In 2009, Jordan was working as a reporter for the Mount Vernon News when he decided to write the next play in what now had become, in his mind, the Mansfield Trilogy.
“I realized the common thread between the two women was their connection to Bromfield. His story would be the culmination of the cycle,” said Mark.
“Louie” was ready for production by the summer of 2010. Joe Mroczkowski was cast in the hefty role of Louie Bromfield, delivering a seemingly effortless performance, while Maureen Browning played his wry spirit guide, a reappearance of Old Phoebe Wise. The play finished its first sold-out season in October of 2010 at Malabar and returned in 2011. Although this was the first of the series he did not personally direct, Mark say this production was the most trouble free of the three.
The most recent effort was a modified production of Ceely in autumn, 2015.
The plays are a delightful evening of entertainment in the barn of this historic spread. The setting is so charming, so authentic, that you might expect to see Louie Bromfield walking the grounds as you wait for the show to begin.
