"The Viewing Room:" live theater about life after death

June 29, 2021 — Live in-person theater was one of many enjoyments that was impossible during the pandemic. Local venues did what they could with virtual fare, but this Friday night, the Willits Community Theatre is reopening its physical, non-virtual doors to an in-the-flesh audience who will file in and take their seats as the lights go down. “The Viewing Room” is a comedy that involves a dysfunctional family, a funeral, and improbable second chances. Mathew Caine directed the play, which was written by Mark Smith and has played elsewhere in California, as well as Australia. We’ll hear from Caine and Jeff Shipp, who plays the angst-ridden son of a patriarch who rises from the dead to make amends with his family.