It's December 1879 in Northern California. Stagecoach driver Charley Parkhurst (trans man), a tobacco-chewin’ bandit-shootin’ local celebrity, has just died. As a lone Barmaid reads about him in the paper, Charley’s ghost revisits her saloon, remembering a night his secret almost got out, many years ago.
Early that evening back in 1861, the pregnant Barmaid stands up to her abusive husband: they need to be saving money. Ever since he lost his job at the mines, he’s been catawomptiously unfriendly and jealous of her successful restaurant business. Charley's stagecoach arrives, having just escaped the notorious bandit Sugarfoot by the skin of their teeth. The passengers, including a medical doctor and a young lady, celebrate Charley's courage while he admits how conflicted he feels about killing Sugarfoot. The Barmaid in turn shares her anger about her husband’s cruelty, and Charley drunkenly insists that the Barmaid could go it alone. After all, it’s a good country for women out west.
The Barmaid and her husband offer Charley a bench as his bed for the stopover night. When the Barmaid’s husband helps the inebriated driver settle in for the night, he discovers Charley’s wearing a corset, and accuses him of immoral behavior. Hearing their fight, the Barmaid emerges with a gun. In the ensuing tussle, the Barmaid kills her husband in self defense after he knocks her in the stomach.
But this exacerbates the bleeding she’s been seeing for a week, and she’s suddenly in the midst of a miscarriage, which she assumes will kill her: it was how her mother died too. To her surprise, instead of fleeing the scene, Charley reveals that he miscarried a child before he came West. He shares the story so that she won't feel as alone as he did, telling her how he escaped an orphanage dressed in boy’s clothes, how he lost his lover and became a stagecoach driver. They concoct a lie to keep the secret of how she killed her husband, allowing her to dream of keeping the eatery. He expects her to spread the word that he is “a woman” and ruin his career, but to his shock, she accepts him with compassion.
Flashing forward, in 1879 the Barmaid and Charley's ghost share a drink, grateful for that moment of solidarity that changed both of their lives. They dream of a time when this will be a good country for folks like them, folks who don’t fit what their world thinks of as proper. And until then, they promise to keep each other's secrets.
Join us on October 17th @5pm in the beautiful Draylen Mason hall at the KMFA studios in downtown Austin, Texas for a concert performance of the new chamber opera, Good Country by composer Keith Allegretti and librettist Cecelia Raker. Learn more about this exciting project and how you can give and get involved by visiting our crowdfunder. Tickets currently available by donation through our crowdfunder which runs through September 17th. Spaces are limited, we hope to see you there!