LAUGHTER NEVER RETIRES PROJECT JOY SPREADS LAUGHS ACROSS CITY

Lunch was filling, the room warm and eyelashes were just about cheek level in the Waterford dining room last week when Jeneen Barratt broke loose.

The toe-tapping, tap-dancing, cowgirl-stomping, hooting and hollerin', camera-snapping, joke-cracking member of the Fun Factory Players was on - and she's just the director. Beside her stood seven vaudevillians with masks, tails and not a trace of self-consciousness.

Out of material? These guys ask for - and get - jokes from the audience.

Tongue twisted? "I just washed my lips and I can't do a thing with them," jokes Barratt when that happens.

Twice a month the Fun Factory Players perform at retirement apartments like the South Hill's Waterford, convalescent centers and fraternal organizations. They are among the 29 Project Joy groups in Spokane who entertain seniors.

Started in 1970, Project Joy now boasts 275 volunteers, mostly seniors themselves. The Fun Factory Players look too young to qualify, but they talk the talk, singing old-time favorites for people over 50.

"By the light of the silvery moon," they belt out in a sing-along. Eyelids around the room open, mouths open and a couple of men in the back begin conducting.

"People say they like us because we don't treat them like little children. We sing the songs they know," says Barratt, a mother of three.

The songs include "My Merry Oldsmobile" and "Let Me Call You Sweetheart," all made possible by Joann Brown, a 45-year church organist and piano teacher in brocade Converse tennis shoes. She plays anything.

Larry Goehner, a retired Boeing employee, appears in boxer shorts and at one point, changes down to a bare chest in front of everyone. "I just do what I'm told," he says, blushing.

Jennell Branson had sung mostly in church choirs before he, like so many others who either lived or played too close to Barratt, wound up here.

The Fun Factory Players were founded last September by Lorna Nollette, director of Project Joy. She wanted something "upbeat and fun, something they could laugh at." The troupe includes Shannon Dickens, Shirley Clark and Delta Dawn Olmsted.

Project Joy, started by the Spokane Parks and Recreation Department, has created a volunteer orchestra, minstrel groups and puppet shows in addition to this theater.

"You call this theater?" Brown wisecracks. When the set crashes to the floor, the players become more energized. When the microphone breaks - twice - they press on. Brown finds her former high school English teacher was in the audience and they leave with three new jokes. But first, they shake the hand of every person in the room.

"Doing things to make other people happy makes the world go round," says Barratt.

For more information on Project Joy, call 535-0584.

Copyright 1996 Cowles Publishing Company
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved.