Photo courtesy of Dale Gutzman
Dale Gutzman and Company's 'Macbeth' (1996)
Dale Gutzman and Company's performance of 'Macbath' in Odesa, Ukraine (1996)
In this year of LGBTQ anniversaries, yet another 30th needs to be recognized. It was in July of 1996 that Dale Gutzman Productions performed Shakespeare’s Macbeth in the Russian Academic Dramatic Theater in Odesa, Ukraine.
Speaking with Gutzman about this monumental undertaking, the first question posed was, logically enough, how did it come about? One can safely say it is not every day that a small Milwaukee theater group manages to perform in an illustrious old venue in Ukraine, of all places. The back-story is as unlikely as the story itself.
As it turns out, back in the 1990s, Gutzman was a regular at Milwaukee’s only Russian restaurant. One evening, the owner approached him and insisted he meet a visiting Russian theater director who happened to be dining alone as well. The ensuing introduction begat a conversation that, in turn, begat a collaboration that set a grand plan for a reciprocal artistic exchange in motion.
Ukrainian Adventure
Photo courtesy of Dale Gutzman
Dale Gutzman and Comapny's 'Macbeth' (1996)
An advertisement for Dale Gutzman and Company's production of 'Macbeth' in Odesa, Ukraine from a Ukrainian newspaper (1996).
Gutzman’s artistic foray into the post-Soviet world of Ukraine was actually in two parts. The first took place two years after the December 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. It was an adventure unto itself with Gutzman leading a company of 15 actors to perform in Kyiv and Odesa. The program included Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and a Gershwin review (Gershwin’s family hailed from Odesa). Now newly independent, Ukraine did not yet have its own currency. The actors were paid in “coupons,” an emergency alternative to allow a semblance of viable commerce. Since there was practically nothing available to buy and the coupons could not be taken out of the country, the whole effort was essentially pro bono. The Ukrainian actors then came to Milwaukee and performed works by Anton Chekov.
Exceptional enough as the first trip was, it was the second that was by far the most historic and ambitious. Gutzman’s motive, he explained, was his vision of directing a bilingual performance with a combined cast of Ukrainian and American actors speaking Russian and English with simultaneous translation. “I knew our hosts loved Shakespeare. What struck me was how literate they were. They love culture and art. Given the political situation and history, Macbeth was the logical choice.”
A year of correspondence with the Ukrainian partners followed. There was much to prepare—from the nuances of the play to the set concept (simple, with suspended wheels symbolic of the passage of the cycle of life), costumes (Soviet era military themed) and props (including bayonets for the death scenes).
Then came the trip to Ukraine. There would be three weeks of rehearsal culminating in four performances in the last week of their stay. The trio of actors, Jim Strange as Macbeth, director Gutzman as MacDuff and others, Roy Hobbes in multiple roles, and a tech manager/assistant director, Fred Ollerman, set off for what would be an adventure of a lifetime.
Drama at the Border
In fact, the drama began moments after landing in Kyiv when customs agents found the bayonets Strange had packed. Border guards promptly detained him for importing illegal weapons. After some convincing, the authorities accepted the artistic nature of the contraband and released the shaken actor. The troupe then arrived in Odesa and moved into an old mansion converted into apartments. Romantic as it sounds, the building was without hot water. Gutzman also recalled the big cockroaches they fought off with their shoes. But the show went on.
Strange, then 26, summed up his personal impressions of the trip saying, “30 years ago was the culmination of the most frightening, exhilarating, exhausting, fulfilling, and singular experience in my life. I opened Macbeth at the Odesa Academic Russian Drama Theater (built in 1876, it is the oldest theater in southern Ukraine). Three Americans and the rest of the cast from Ukraine. We spoke English. They did not. For the big speeches, I would pause and our brilliant, beautiful translator would give a short synopsis. I have some specific memories, arriving in Odesa, not being able to work the keys to our apartment half the time, going to an Air Vienna office and unsuccessfully trying to get a flight home two weeks in and waiting in the wings trying to breathe while the weird sisters finished up their babbling, among many others. But mostly, I remember feelings: love, fear, frustration, joy, sorrow,” adding, “I couldn’t have done it without Dale and will be forever grateful for his trust. Odesa and her people are burned into my soul. I will never forget their kindness.”
Transnational Exchange
That kindness was expressed in sold-out houses with audiences, in typical local fashion, applauding in unison and showering Strange with floral bouquets. Some, Gutzman recalled, were moved to tears reliving their Soviet experiences through the Shakespearean tale.
About a year later, over a dozen Ukrainian actors and crew took part in Carroll College and Madison performances. Their planned return for a possible off-Broadway run was thwarted unexpectedly; the U.S. State Department cancelled the visas of the Ukrainian cast claiming they would be taking jobs from Americans. The project then ground to a halt. In an understatement Gutzman merely said, “It was a difficult effort that worked out.” Strange was more reflective. Referring to the Odesa Steps (yes, those steps made famous in Sergei Eisenstein’s 1925 film Battleship Potemkin), Strange reminisced, “my favorite spot in the world is a bench on an acacia lined lane just off the steps. I would go back in a heartbeat.”
Five years later, Gutzman opened the black box company, Off the Wall Theatre (OTW). For 20 years it presented quirky and queer tinged stage productions spanning the full gamut of classical and modern plays, some authored by Gutzman himself. Forced to close his OTW under the strain of the Covid pandemic, today Gutzman continues his artistic contribution to Milwaukee’s cultural scene as a novelist, writing and self-publishing well over a dozen works of queer historical fiction that are available through Amazon.
Jim Strange continued his stage career with OTW to glowing reviews. Eventually, he created his drag persona, Maple Veneer. Earlier this year he celebrated another anniversary, his seventh as half of the duo Bosom Buddies with local drag icon Karen Valentine.
The theater, meanwhile, has been renamed since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. It is now officially called the Odesa Regional Academic Drama Theater. Thus far it has survived the war relatively unscathed.
The Odesa Macbeth marked a moment in Milwaukee queer history that few may be aware of. It was, however, an extraordinary cultural exchange that touched and enriched many across continents.
