With Mother’s Day just around the corner, we’ll start to see and read tributes to moms from all walks of life. There will surely be homages to devoted, courageous, brilliant, funny, hardworking moms — but what about moms who are more like Joan Crawford’s Mommie Dearest?

Are there any adult children brave enough to go on record, saying that Mom might have had issues?

Constance Wilder-Wokoun, who co-wrote and will direct the two-act comedy Project Mom (Version 2.0), says, when putting her play together, she learned of at least one example of a “Mommie Dearest.” The funny thing is, the daughter who revealed this information is hoping and praying her mom doesn’t read between the lines and get hurt feelings. Even if our mothers were monsters, we don’t want to disrespect them.

The seeds for Project Mom came from actual essays Ms. Wilder-Wokoun and Ken Britschge, the play’s co-author, publicist and all-around techie, solicited from friends and family.

”We asked 25 women and 25 men to write something and, although the men didn’t come through, 22 women did,” Ms. Wilder-Wokoun says. “The idea was to put a ‘Project Mom’ book together but the more we read the essays, the more we thought, ‘Why don’t we make this a play?’ We wanted to see these (stories) as they happen. It’s interesting because, during rehearsals, our cast members will say ‘That’s just like my mother.’ (These vignettes) really hit a nerve with people and Ken and I are tickled when that happens.”

The original comedy concerns the staff of an upscale women’s magazine as they sift through the submissions of a “best essay about mothers” contest. The women mine the letters for universal truths and learn more about themselves as mothers, or potential mothers, in the process. First staged in 2006, the updated Project Mom has a whole new feel to it, with fresh stories, cast and even a ballet sequence.

Project Mom will be performed at Riverside Studios in Bordentown, May 9 through 11.

Ms. Wilder-Wokoun and Mr. Britschge of Project Comma Mom Productions have been working on the new script assiduously for almost a year, as well as tying up the loose ends of various production tasks, working with the cast and getting the word out. Since both have full-time jobs, it’s been a labor of love.

”From June to December or January it wasn’t so bad — we’ll write one day a week,” Mr. Britschge says. “But in February when we start doing casting and whatnot, it can get a little hairy. But I just love it.”

Mr. Britschge says he’s been writing since childhood and “hanging around” the theater since high school, at what was then McCorristin Catholic High School in Hamilton, where Ms. Wilder-Wokoun taught for decades.

”She always did the spring musicals,” Mr. Britschge says. “I did lighting design, built sets, those kind of things.”

The team put Project Mom aside last year when they staged The Faculty Room, a comedy centered around a fictitious Catholic high school. They are working on a new script for Project Mom, scheduled for completion in 2009. Project Mom: A Collection of Essays has also been self-published as a book, and is available through www.amazon.com, www.barnesandnoble.com and www.iuniverse.com.
 

Mr. Britschge says the ballet sequence — performed between the two acts — should be a real treat, and was choreographed by Susanne McClure, the artistic director of Arts Youniversity in Hamilton.
 

”There was a long passage that Connie (Ms. Wilder-Wokoun) had written about her first big dance in school,” he says. “She had nothing to wear so her mother began fashioning a dress out of things from around the house. There was something nostalgic about the story and the more we talked about it, the more we figured we’d do it as a ballet sequence.”
 

A graduate of Seton Hall University, Mr. Britschge is a published songwriter and poet. The Hamilton resident works for Peterson’s, the educational publishing company in Lawrence. Ms. Wilder-Wokoun, also from Hamilton, is a graduate of Fordham University, a veteran educator and author. She retired from McCorristin in 2003 but just couldn’t put her teaching aside. She now teaches English at SciCore Academy in Hightstown.
 

”We run a family kind of company,” Mr. Britschge says. “We like to work with people who we like. For the time that we’re putting in, we want to be enjoying ourselves. We keep things upbeat and people have responded to that too.”

Project Mom (Version 2.0) will be performed at Riverview Studios, Farnsworth Ave., Bordentown, May 9-11. Performances: Fri. 7:30 p.m., Sat.-Sun. 1, 7 p.m. Tickets cost $10 and can be reserved and/or purchased at Silk & Tweed 148 Farnsworth Ave., Bordentown. (609) 298-4456. Limited seating for all shows. Constance Wilder-Wokoun and Ken Britschge will be signing their book at Borders , 601 Nassau Park Blvd., West Windsor, May 8, 6 p.m. Project Mom on the Web: www.projectmom.net 

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