"Leading Ladies" cast members are in front, from left, Lee Abelson, Kendra Gross, Patti Gross, Keith Collins, Shandra Burnett and Doug Strickland. In back are Eric Schubert and Don Strickland.

Don Strickland and Eric Schubert are playing the title roles in "Leading Ladies," the Ken Ludwig farce that opens tonight at the Mountain Arts Community Theater on Signal Mountain.

The dessert theater is the winter production of Signal Mountain Playhouse, according to Anne Rittenberry, SMP board member.

The comedy's plot revolves around Jack (Schubert) and Leo (Strickland), two down-and-out Shakespearean actors who are working the Moose Lodge circuit in the Amish country of Pennsylvania. The actors discover from a newspaper ad that a wealthy elderly woman is searching for her two nephews, to whom she plans to leave her fortune when she dies.

Thinking they'll score easy cash, the two decide to pass themselves off as her long-lost nephews. But when they arrive in New York, they find out the missing relatives aren't nephews but nieces.

How they solve that dilemma and the romantic complications that result will keep audiences laughing.

Rittenberry said director David Wood has assembled a cast of actors who are veterans of Playhouse productions as well as of the Chattanooga Theatre Centre. In addition to Strickland and Schubert, the cast includes Kendra Gross, Patti Gross, Shandra Burnett, Keith Collins, Lee Abelson and Doug Strickland.

Doors open at the MACC at 6:45 p.m. for dessert and coffee before the 8 p.m. curtain. Tickets may be bought at the door or at the MACC box office between 9 a.m. and 2 p.m. or 4-7 p.m. Monday-Friday. They may also be reserved by phone at 886-1959.

Contact Susan Pierce at spierce@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6284.