In County of Theatrics, Parody Set the Stage For a Battle in Court

But she didn't say anything. Actually, she couldn't say anything: Her mouth was taped shut.

At the previous board meeting, Supervisor Stephen J. Snow (R-Dulles) had referred to Kelly as an "idiot" after she blurted out a remark about his ancestors (he later apologized). So in part to protest Snow's comment, Kelly attended the meeting wearing a piece of duct tape over her mouth, one of several theatrical presentations she has made before the supervisors over the years.

She once attended a meeting wearing a Barbra Streisand-style mask. She was so displeased by the board's Republican majority that she displayed for them her idea for a new county flag: a collage of flags from North Korea, the Taliban in Afghanistan and other regimes. And there was the time she dumped plastic Monopoly houses -- 100,000 of them ordered specially in red -- on a local map at a hearing.

She said these demonstrations were an attention-grabbing way of expressing her views against unchecked growth.

Grigsby also has strong opinions about growth -- and Valerie Kelly's boardroom theatrics. The 41-year-old Hillsboro computer programmer, who agreed to be interviewed only by e-mail, is a property rights advocate who has sparred with Kelly and other smart-growth proponents on Internet forums and in local newspapers' letters sections.

Grigsby described his skit as "one of those 1 a.m. ideas" that he now regrets. He said that he intended it as a harmless joke, featuring a fictional "cartoonish Joe Six-Pack" character. Grigsby and Bob Kelly had never met, and Grigsby maintained that had he known Valerie Kelly was married, he would have picked a different persona. He said his performance was merely a satirical response to Valerie Kelly's antics, which he found offensive.

"I don't understand her, but I certainly don't wish her ill," Grigsby wrote in his e-mail. "I was, as a friend from Buffalo would say, 'busting her chops.' As everyone knows, 'the blonde' I said I was 'shacking up' with was my wife."

Bob Kelly bears no resemblance to Grigsby's character: He is the soft-spoken, clean-shaven owner of a tiny but bustling yarn shop in Middleburg. He teaches crochet, color theory and knitting classes (there's a waiting list) and prides himself on stocking the shelves with bamboo needles made in Japan and wool from Uruguay.

He worried that being portrayed as a drunk and an adulterer at a public meeting shown live on local cable television had damaged his reputation and hurt his business. He said sales dropped by thousands of dollars for three months after Grigsby's skit.

"What if somebody clicks it on just as he's saying my name is Mr. Valerie Kelly and as they watch it they say, 'What a jerk,' and then they click it off, just after I'm shacked up with a blonde," Bob Kelly, 56, said as he sat inside Hunt Country Yarns one recent evening, knitting with a frizzy, green-and-red sample of designer yarn. "They have no idea that's Mr. Grigsby."

Throughout the county, where some residents have become so frustrated with the pace of development that they talk seriously about seceding to break away from suburban Loudoun, people's opinions about the case often split down party lines.

Supporters of growth donated money for Grigsby's legal fees and felt that the Kellys were using a silly skit as an excuse to haul someone from their side to court. Development opponents found the skit repulsive and hoped that the lawsuit would make pro-growth types think twice before doing anything like that again.