Post Script

When Carol “Orange” Schroeder has an idea, she pursues it — especially one that promotes the performing arts. This season, Schroeder is marking her 10th year of hosting recorded interviews with the actors, directors and designers who create productions all summer long at American Players Theatre in Spring Green. These 15-20 minute discussions, originally called “Talkbacks to Go,” debuted in 2014 and were available for purchase or as donor gifts on CD. Now dubbed Portable Prologues, they can be downloaded as podcasts from Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Podbean, or from the APT website (under the “news” dropdown).

The interviews are a behind-the-scenes discussion, a marketing tool, a director’s note in audio form, and an archive of APT’s plays from both the Touchstone and the Hill theaters for the past decade.

In the aftermath of a tragic event, it’s natural to ask two questions: how and why? In the absence of any explanation or someone to hold accountable the questions persist, repeated ad nauseum by a sensational news cycle. 

In 2017, when an oblivious jogger shoved a woman into the path of an oncoming London bus, the incident was caught on surveillance video and the whole country asked how? Why? The man was never identified or apprehended so the questions linger, even now. 

This event is the inspiration for Sonya Kelly’s play, Once Upon a Bridge, which was commissioned by the Druid Theatre Company and debuted virtually during the pandemic in Galway. Now American Players Theatre has mounted the American premiere of the compelling three-hander, which runs in the indoor Touchstone Theatre through Oct. 7. Made up of direct-address monologues, the play presents an extensive backstory for the jogger, the pedestrian and the bus driver who swerved just in time to avert disaster. But instead of focusing on the actual traumatic event, this fascinating character study explores the before and after of that day. Directed by APT actor and director Laura Rook, it is a compelling story of three complex people whose lives collide for a split second and are forever altered.

In American Players Theatre’s current production of Thornton Wilder’s classic Our Town, the beginning of the play sneaks up on you. One moment APT doyenne and core company member Sarah Day is welcoming the audience to the show and asking everyone to turn off their cell phones and the next minute she’s slipped into the play’s main character, the Stage Manager. An omniscient narrator who gently leads the audience through the story, she invites us to spy on the citizens of the quaint hamlet of Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire, on a summer day in 1904. 

Like a wistful former mayor of a quintessentially American small town, Day’s character speaks fondly of the community. She knows each citizen intimately and is equally proud of their quirks and eccentricities and forgiving of their shortcomings. She sets the scene for each act, fills in the blanks on the stage’s traditionally bare set, ushers actors on and off the stage and even invites a few distinguished townspeople to expound on the town’s history, geography, politics and predilections. Slipping into the background during scenes that focus on the townspeople, her gray blouse blends in seamlessly with the weathered gray wood of the set. But when she needs to guide our attention to the next part of a deceptively pointed story, her clear voice cuts cleanly through the air of nostalgia and rings out over the crowd. 

American Players Theatre is reveling in silliness this season, first with its fresh, light take on the slightest of Shakespeare's comedies — The Merry Wives of Windsor — and now with The Liar, a newly updated version of a 400-year-old French comedy that looks like a technicolor candy store, sounds like a Dr. Seuss book, and plays like a raucous delight. The relatively small cast of The Liar is packed with the next generation of APT all-stars, who are on point and on fire, racing from one fantastic misunderstanding to the next at breakneck speed. Directed with panache by Keira Fromm, the production runs through Sept. 29 at the Hill Theatre. 

For more than 20 years, Madison Opera has been performing an astounding feat. In addition to presenting a season of fully staged operas at Overture Center, the company also produces Opera in the Park, a free outdoor summer concert for upwards of 10,000 people. For the spectators it is a fantastic opportunity to picnic on the grass under the stars and enjoy being serenaded by rising stars from the opera world, accompanied by a full orchestra. For the staff at the Madison Opera it is a herculean task. 

“I age a year during that week, due to all the stress,” says Kathryn Smith, general director of Madison Opera. “But when it works and we’ve made that many people happy, everyone believes it’s worthwhile. And it’s part of our reason for being — we’re here to entertain our community.” 

Just before the biggest boxing match of Jay “The Sport” Jackson’s life, his manager Max spells out the stakes. “You’re going to go in there. You’re going to knock him out in three. Your name’s gonna get written in history, and not in Black history Jay, not in white history either Jay. In something better. In sports history.” That is the dream of the main character in Marco Ramirez’s play The Royale — to transcend race and earn the title of world champion heavyweight boxer, not just the best Black athlete to step into the ring. 

Under the deft direction of Tyrone Phillips, a taut, moving, emotion- and action-packed production of The Royale opened on June 24 in the indoor Touchstone at American Players Theatre will run through September 27. But this stunning piece is about much more than boxing. The poetic, layered play based on real events explores the personal cost of fighting against systemic racism and the reality of race-related violence in turn-of-the-20th century America. 

In the pre-show speech for Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor, the rotund rogue Falstaff (David Daniel) tells the audience in American Players Theatre’s outdoor Hill Theatre to silence their cell phones and meet him after the show (with cash in hand) if they want to take any photos. Then he officially introduces the play as The Adventures of Falstaff. Such is the bravado and ego of one of classical theater’s most notable larger-than-life characters — a man of great appetites, bombast and self-serving schemes. Falstaff is just one of the captivating characters we meet in this delightful, season-opening production directed by Terri McMahon, which runs through Oct. 8. 

Removed from any literal time and place, this production’s Windsor is an exuberantly colored, fantastical world, watched over by the statue of a bright pink stag. The driving beats of contemporary music introduce hijinks in nearly every scene, thanks to energetic sound design and compositions by Sartje Pickett. Those riffs frequently accompany Brian Cowing’s playful choreography — including an opening dance taught by the cheekily-named teacher “Artura Murray.” Whimsical scenic design by Scott Penner captures a modern, irreverent-hipster vibe, juxtaposing bold navy classical shapes with a metallic gold column and an enormous pink boombox that doubles as a bar. And Susan Tsu’s costumes run the maximalist gamut from voluminous, corseted dresses in bright floral satin and brocade frippery, to layers of quirky street fashion, accessorized with top hats. In this dimension of extremes, love and loyalty are tested, petty differences are forgiven, buffoonery is exposed, and real treachery doesn’t stand a chance. 

Instead of telling the story of the 1899 newsboys strike this summer, Capital City Theatre will be celebrating the golden age of musical theater and the career of Kate Baldwin — a Broadway leading lady with Wisconsin roots. The concert will be performed one night only, on June 24 in the Capitol Theater at Overture Center. 

“When we had to cancel Newsies, we knew that we wanted to put something in its place that was artistically unique and could utilize our amazing orchestra,” Capital City artistic director Andrew Abrams says. “I immediately thought of Kate. I’m a huge fan of all that she does. I even told my voice students in New York City to go see her in Big Fish as a master class on how to sing effortlessly.” 

Baldwin was equally excited to get a call from a theater in her former home state. “It’s a thrill to be able to come back to Wisconsin to perform,” she tells Isthmus in a recent phone interview. “And I have lots of friends and family coming to see the show.” 

A friend of mine asked me recently what I look for in a great evening of theater. I waxed poetic in my response, insisting that “I want to be wowed. To be astonished. To be emotionally moved, surprised, and dazzled by stagecraft. I want to be in awe of performances and be reminded why I believe that theater is the single greatest form of communication on the planet.” I finished this lofty statement by admitting that it doesn’t happen very often, but when it does, the waiting is totally worth it.

I did not expect the first national tour of The SpongeBob Musical to fit into the “knock my socks off and remind me of all the reasons I love theater” category. But it does.

There is nothing like enjoying a play, musical or concert outdoors on a warm Wisconsin summer night. If you’re lucky, the moon and stars will come out on cue, and you’ll be joined in the audience by lightning bugs and a chorus of crickets. The crowd’s applause will be augmented by the sound of rustling leaves in nearby trees and whippoorwills calling, while the faint smell of citronella candles and campfires wafts through the air. While your first thought might be of American Players Theatre, there are a surprising number of other outdoor stages to consider, too.