HARRISON – Before there was the award-winning movie with Katherine Hepburn and Henry Fonda, there was the award-winning play, a play that has been revived on Broadway twice. A play that has been produced in more than 38 countries in 24 languages.

“On Golden Pond,” Ernest Thompson’s touching, funny and warmly perceptive story of the enduring love of a long marriage, will be presented at 8 p.m. Aug. 23, 24 and 25 at Deertrees Theatre.

The story is the deceptively simple tale of one family’s summer on a lake in Maine. Professor Norman Thayer Jr. and his wife, Ethel, are spending their 46th summer together on Golden Pond, Maine – a wooded lakeside area, where the mail is delivered by boat and the telephone still has a real operator. Ethel, in her late 60s, is a hardy, forward-looking woman, eager to get back to nature and enjoy the summer. Norman, about to turn 80 (his birthday will be celebrated during the summer), is the crotchety sort; and since his health is not the best, he is more than a bit obsessed with death. The Thayers are quite happy together, although the same cannot be said for their daughter, Chelsea. A longtime divorcee, she and Norman have never gotten along, nor do they now when she arrives for his 80th birthday party with her new boyfriend, Bill, and his 13 year-old son, Billy.

Norman and Billy take to each other almost immediately, and when Chelsea asks if she can leave Billy with her parents for a month so she and Bill can spend some time alone, her father readily agrees. As the summer passes, Billy becomes the grandson Norman never had, setting the stage for a confrontation when Chelsea returns with some surprising news.

“On Golden Pond” is a heartwarming and hilarious celebration of the everyday struggles and ultimate triumphs of life, love and family.

Tickets are $20, $10 for students. They are available from the box office by calling 583-6747, online at www.deertreestheatre.org, and at the Cool Moose in Bridgton, the Country Sleigh in Naples, Fare Share Co-op in Norway and Books N Things in Bethel.