Suburban theater troupes set for new season

Overture, curtains, lights

This is it, we'll hit the heights

And oh what heights we'll hit

On with the show this is it -- theme from "The Bugs Bunny Show"

While actors chase subtle nuance, directors fine-tune theatrical vision and crew members work out the set design details of lights and sound, opening night inexorably draws closer at community theater houses all over the Western suburbs.

Drama, comedy, musicals, musical comedies -- theater goers will find them all this season in plentiful supply.

Along with a listing of shows staged this fall through next spring, we take a closer look at the offerings from two local powerhouse mainstays -- Wheaton Drama and Glen Ellyn's Village Theatre Guild.

Wheaton Drama offers two comedies, two musical comedies and one drama this season, a lineup that reflects its responsiveness to audience sensibilities.

"We know that our musicals are very successful," said Joan Morrissey, a longtime member of the troupe. "We like to do a couple of comedies."

The season opens with "Nunsense," a musical comedy about New Jersey nuns.

"It's a little warped in concept," said director Scott Neidl. "It's kind of a dark comedy premise, but it's not a dark comedy."

Neidl said the darkest part of the show is the start, when the audience learns the nuns are trying to raise money to bury several nuns accidentally killed by the convent cook.

There's a number titled "We've Got To Clean Out the Freezer," a reference to the temporary resting place of the deceased.

"After that, it's a straightforward comedy. It's sheer entertainment. It's not any deep, hidden agenda to it. It's a real goofy little show," Neidl said.

He added that prospective audience members should know that they won't just sit back and watch the action unfold.

"It's not conventional theater," he said. "The nuns interact with the audience."

Neidl said shy audience types need not fear the limelight's direct glare.

"I don't pull up anyone on stage," he said, adding that only willing participants who raise their hands will be approached by one of the five cast members.

"Nunsense" opened Friday and runs through Oct. 14.

Next up is "A Christmas Story," a stage version of the popular movie about a 9-year-old Midwestern boy's Christmas wish for a Red Ryder BB gun. The show runs Nov. 23 to Dec. 16.

"At Christmas, we always try to do something that's family-oriented," Morrissey said.

Another comedy, "I Hate Hamlet," is a look at the creative process that has a TV actor squaring off against the ghost of legendary Shakespearean actor John Barrymore. It runs Jan. 25 to Feb. 17.

The season's sole drama, "A Few Good Men," will be directed by Morrissey and will open March 28 and run through April 20. The story concerns the trial of two Marines suspected of involvement in a fellow Marine's death. It takes place in Guantanamo Bay.

"I like classics. I like dramas. I think it's very relevant in view of what's going on now," Morrissey said, adding that "justice, patriotism and the rule of law" are ideas explored in the show.

"It's a very exciting courtroom drama. The buzz is out there. I think people are excited about seeing it," she said.

Wheaton Drama's season wraps up with "Little Shop of Horrors," a musical comedy about a flesh-eating plant. It is slated for May 30 to June 22.

Following Village Theatre Guild's successful early August run of "A Midsummer Night's Cabaret," with audience members invited to an after-performance party with cast and crew under the stars, this fall's season opener is another musical, "Showtune: Celebrating the Words and Music of Jerry Herman."

The revue celebrates Herman's perennial favorites tunes with "Mame," "Hello, Dolly" and "La Cage aux Folles" Oct. 19 to Nov. 10.

A drama, "Three Days of Rain," makes its belated entry into the Village Theatre Guild calendar Jan. 18 to Feb. 9.

"We couldn't do it last year because Julia Roberts was doing it on Broadway," said Sue Keenan, the show's co-producer and a founding member of the Glen Ellyn community theater group.

Now that the show is available, she said, the theater troupe's play-reading committee again selected it as one of about 25 options laid out for the season's four directors. The Richard Greenberg script was ultimately selected by director Chuck Bernstein.

"It's the story of a brother and a sister and a friend," Keenan said.

In the first act, the trio meets to divide their late fathers' fortune. The second act is set 30 years earlier, in the same Manhattan loft, and features the parents of the characters featured in the first act.

The theater's timeline shifts 100 years with "Romance, Romance," the season's third show, March 31 to April 12. This musical features two acts of separate stories, one with modern-day characters and the other set in the early 20th century. Both focus on love and romance, Keenan said.

"Musicals are always big sellers," Keenan said. "People like comedies. We try to do at least one really good drama every year."

Comedy and drama combine in "The O'Conner Girls," a show that runs May 23 to June 14.

"This particular play touched a chord with me because I could identify with the women in this play and their Irish Catholic background," said director Marianne Bowles. "It's a comedy-drama about family relationships. The hurts can go deep, but the bonds are still there."

Bowles, who has experience as an actor and has directed several one-act plays, is making her debut as director of a full-length show.

"It's such a charming play," she said. "As soon as I read it, I said, 'This is the one I've got to do.' I think a director always needs to find that."