Ten years ago, Theatre Gigante teamed up with UW-Whitewater professor and long-time Gigante performer James Butchart to create an adaptation of Woyzeck, a play originally written by esteemed German dramatist Georg Büchner that remained incomplete due to his early death. The production now returns as part of the company’s 28th season with some variation, featuring a new singer and dancer as well as different cast members.
“It’s been really wonderful to readdress this because we have great memories of it and so it’s been a real treat to be able to go in and play with it and refigure it, reconstruct it,” says Theatre Gigante Co-Artistic Director Isabelle Kralj. “It’s a great example of expressionist theater and I like to say also, in a way, socio-political theater.”
Woyzeck is based on the true story of Johann Christian Woyzeck, a wig maker-turned-soldier who, in a fit of jealousy, murdered Christiane Woost, a widow with whom he had been living. “I think the play is thought-provoking and relevant to every age. It’s really kind of an important piece to look at in today’s world because it’s about the dehumanizing of an individual—a young man who is honest and innocent and earnest—and the powers that be, how they can use him to their advantages disregarding the fact that this is a human being. It also speaks to jealously. Woyzeck is destroyed by his own,” says Kralj. She adds, “Because of the style, the poetic qualities of it, the comedy in it, the music, it doesn’t hammer you, it doesn’t hit you over the head. It’s a nice ode to a human being, to individuality, to the respect we should have for a life, but it also has its funny moments, its cartoon-like characters, a little slapstick, gorgeous music.”
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Paris-based chanteuse Christine Zufferey and the show’s music director, Frank Pahl, will perform songs by Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan. Performers include Kralj, Mark Anderson, Michael Stebbins, Edwin Olvera and Leslie Fitzwater.
“I’m very proud of Theatre Gigante. People have referred to us as avant-garde and experimental, but I think in the long run we have a very accessible approach to the avant-garde and are always, when we are working and putting things together, thinking about the accessibility to the audience: challenging them, but making sure that it is something that is understandable, that has a narrative string to it,” says Kralj. “I think personally that’s the strength of Gigante: It manages to be unique and different from main stage productions and yet not there just for a few people who might like something more experimental. I think it’s very accessible.”
Woyzeck runs March 4-12 at the Kenilworth 508 Theater, 1925 E. Kenilworth Place. For more information and tickets, call 414-961-6119 or visit theatregigante.org.
Theatre Happenings:
n UW-Milwaukee’s Peck School of the Arts, James Tomasello and members of the nonprofit TRUE Skool present the Milwaukee premiere of Corktown, by playwright Jeff Augustin. Corktown is described as “a study of gentrification, the past, present and future of a fallen city” and “a play about coming of age in a changing world.” Show runs March 2-6 at the Mainstage Theatre, 2400 E. Kenwood Blvd. For tickets, call 414-229-4308 or visit psoacal.uwm.edu/event/corktown.
n The Highland Community Players bring to stage the “gritty western” The Bully, The Liar & the Thief. The play features nearly 50 fourth, fifth and sixth grade-age actors and stage crew in this story about three community-deemed outlaws trying to win their rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Show runs Wednesday, March 2 and Friday, March 4 at 6:30 p.m. at Highland Community School, 1706 W Highland Ave. For more information, visit facebook.com/highlandcommunityplayers.
n Be amazed by the uncanny tales told in Splinter Group’s Shipwrecked! An Entertainment: The Amazing Adventures of Louis de Rougemont (as told by himself), by Donald Margulies. This powerful play about the strength of storytelling and how we choose to create our legacy runs March 3-13 at The Marian Center for Non Profits, 3211 S. Lake Drive. For tickets, visit splintergroup.brownpapertickets.com.
n The Foreigner, by Larry Shue, had its world premiere at the Milwaukee Repertory Theater in the mid-’80s and now this two-act comedy staple comes to Sunset Playhouse. Charlie is afraid of making conversation with strangers, but when his friend Froggy tells a crowd he speaks no English, he overhears more than he plans. Show runs March 3-20 at the Furlan Auditorium, 800 Elm Grove Road, Elm Grove. For tickets, call 262-782-4430 or visit sunsetplayhouse.com.
n Off the Wall Theatre presents Peter Brook’s highly restructured and edited version of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, described by Off the Wall’s Director Dale Gutzman as a “radical production” that will integrate each show’s 25-member audience in a “nightmare world of deception and intrigue.” Show runs March 4-20 at 127 E. Wells St. For more information and tickets, call 414-484-8874 or visit offthewalltheatre.com.
n Waukesha Civic Theatre performs Ken Ludwig’s Leading Ladies, a story of two English actors who, having fallen on hard times, try to pass themselves off as a local old lady’s long-lost heirs. Show runs March 4-20 at the Margaret Brate Bryant Civic Theatre Building, 264 W. Main Street. For tickets, call 262-547-0708 or visit waukeshacivictheatre.org.
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