Nancy and Hedges Capers are re-examining what it means to age in our society. While most like to complain about aging in some way or another, the truth, to these two, is that it is all in your head. Both have lead impressive careers in various forms of media, and although these careers span several decades, they can’t seem to escape the Summer of Love.
The couple is now producing a “boomer-geared” musical about aging positively, both humorous and poignant, titled “The Geeze and Me.” “The Geeze and Me” will be showing at from March 31 to April 29 at the 10th Avenue Arts Center, 930 10th Avenue. Each performance costs $30 to attend and will be held on Thursdays at 7:30 p.m., Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m., and Sundays at 2 p.m.
“Look up ‘retire’ and ‘old’ in a dictionary,” said Nancy Locke Capers. “You’ll find similar negative descriptions for being ‘out of use,’ or ‘in the past.’ In Hedges and my experience, this has not been the case. We wanted to do something that reflected how we’ve come to enjoy this wonderful part of our lives.”
“People want to think that when you get older, your hearing, joints, eyesight, and other basic functions start to degenerate. In reality, this all starts around the age of 10, so there’s really no excuse,” quipped Hedges Capers.
Hedges Capers grew up in La Jolla. He attended LJ Elementary and had Mr. Kaufmann as a teacher during his first year. During the ‘60s, he was a member of one of the first interracial folk-singing duos, Hedge and Donna. During his time touring with this act, he encountered firsthand the racial prejudice that still exists in the U.S. Like most during their generation, this greatly affected his outlook on equality and social justice. Nancy Locke-Capers has spent countless hours on the stage, working in theater, films, and as a screenwriter in Los Angeles (she had a script produced and sold to Paramount). She has also worked as the creative director for Alliance LA. Both herself and Hedges are noted marriage and family therapists who moved to La Jolla more than 20 years ago. “We started writing this five years ago,” says Hedges Capers. “I had a bunch of unrecorded music from over the years, and I wanted to write love stories through my music. We were thinking about a relevant topic, and it popped up… ‘Why not do it on aging?’” Initially, Hedges Capers was not going to have an acting role in the production of “The Geeze and Me,” but during a reading tour of the production, “He was fantastic,” said his wife.
Out of the entire cast, only two actresses are from Los Angeles. “There are some very talented people in this production,” said Hedges Capers. “We are truly blessed. From choreographer Joanne Lovejoy (a San Diego native) to our music director, BJ Robinson, we could not have asked for a better team to work with.” Although “The Geeze and Me” focuses on life after “retirement,” the husband and wife encourage that the musical pertains to all ages and aspects of life. “My daughter is in her early thirties,” said Nancy Locke Capers. “After seeing the dress rehearsal, she exclaimed ‘I need to get some of my friends out to this.’”
Hedges and Nancy Locke Capers still carry that impenetrable Sixties ideal that so long as love and vitality exist, that the forces of old and evil will be overcome. While for them, La Jolla has been a nice place to “retire,” they are definitely redefining the meaning of the word.