Associated Bank Theater Center – Page 2

April 18, 2026

Mrs. Christie. Where Were You…

Wisconsin playwright Heidi Armbruster leans into her strength and writes in a seemingly serious drama format but then wraps it all up in a hilarious comedy. This time Armbruster dabbles in a parallel universe around an unexplained disappearance by Agatha Christie in 1926 and a super-fan tries to solve the case from clues ‘discovered’ at a 2026 Christie festival on Christie’s estate.

Pictured L to R: Alex Keiper and Betsy Hogg. Photo by Michael Brosilow.

We first meet Agatha Christie in her home totally upset because she believes her dog has died. Alex Keiper’s Agatha is distraught, distracted, and clearly mentally elsewhere. And in many ways this sets the tone for her character deeper into the play. Armbruster’s and Keiper’s Agatha Christie isn’t the smart focused British writer that we would have anticipated. The very next instant it appears the dog is still with us but Agatha is also confronted with the open infidelity of her husband, Archibald Christie. And Matt Bowdren’s Archie is precisely the imperious and stuffy aristocrat that you might expect. Agatha clearly still loves him and he clearly wants to go and they are at an impasse. She won’t give him a divorce so he wants to prevent her from writing. Archie does everything in his power to hurt Agatha including parading his paramour around in their home.

Pictured L to R: Zoë Sophia Garcia, Alex Keiper, Dale Hodges, Blake Hamilton Currie. Photo by Michael Brosilow.

And then it is 2026 and there is an Agatha Christie festival going on on the grounds of the Christie estate. On the grounds is an important factor because we find ourselves in the same library work place as in the earlier 1926 scene. The home is now a museum and the library is off limits during the festival yet people keep wandering in. First is Lucy, a fan of Christie, who is attending the festival, and I guess is something of an ‘ugly American’? Zoe Sophia Garcia presents Lucy at seemingly loose ends and a little free with her hands. Touching everything, a few ‘relics’ make their way to her purse before she is confronted by the caretaker. She talks her way into staying a few more minutes when she encounters William, a Christie scholar and assistant to a Christie scholar. Blake Hamilton Currie is a smooth sexy lothario as William. And he has a few photocopied pages of a ‘lost’ Christie notebook that he uses as bait to seduce incredulous Christie fan girls. Garcia’s Lucy plays along but might be the better player and somehow manages to take possession of the lost papers. And then Dale Hodges as Jane wanders in. An elderly lady seeming just a bit confused, she sits down and starts knitting. But, she too is more than she seems and ends up partnering with Lucy to solve the mystery suggested in the purloined pages. Tally HO!

Pictured L to R: William Sturdivant and Alex Keiper. Photo by Michael Brosilow.

To avoid spoiling too much fun, I will simply say that we follow Christie to a seaside resort where she seems to exist in a drug induced haze…and Monsieur Hercule Poirot makes an appearance. Their conversations poke a lot of fun at detective story traditions and William Sturdivant nails the Poirot stereotype right on the head. And our intrepid Jane and Lucy turn their search for a solution into a scavenger hunt of sorts.

Pictured the cast of Mrs. Christie. Photo by Michael Brosilow.

But never fear, there is a traditional resolution. As a book end to a dinner gathering in Act I, all of the characters are again gathered together in the dining room of the Christie home. And everything is pretty formal and cold until Archie’s arm candy, Nancy, played by Amira Danan, falls to the floor after drinking her glass of wine. Everyone in the room has a motive and Poirot steps to the forefront. Every detective story ox is gored, all is revealed, and a solution to the case is found. This scene generated the greatest amount of laughter of the evening…as it should! It is smartly overwritten, overwrought, and overacted with hilarious results.

And laughter: kudos for Director Joanie Schultz for pulling out all of the wonderful humor built into this play. I didn’t expect to have quite this much fun with Mrs. Christie.

Character that you will hate: Charlotte, Mrs. Christie’s secretary. She is played by Betsy Hogg and shows up later as the 2026 as the gate keeper in the library, and at the beach resort. Hogg performs as exactly the same character in all three instances.

Pictured L to R: Dale Hodges and Zoë Sophia Garcia. Photo by Michael Brosilow.

Character that you will love: Dale Hodges, Jane. She is maybe the smartest cookie in the box and draws in our empathy as we watch her move through the real world. Generally she likes to travel alone but is willing to humor Lucy!

At one point, Lucy declares that they are just going around in circles. And at that point she and Jane literally are as the Rep has again pulled out a rotating stage. Initially used to change room locales, during their travels, our intrepid searchers are walking around the edge of the stage as it rotates. Marvelous scenic work by Se Hyun Oh.

Now, fair warning. This play requires all of your concentration. There are moments of sleight of hand that need to be seen that are important to the story. And with the English accents and Poirot’s Belgian French, you want to pay attention so you don’t miss a good joke!

Mrs. Christie runs about two hours and 15 minutes including an intermission. It is being presented on the main stage of the Checota Powerhouse Theater. It runs from now through May 10, 2026. Additional information and tickets can be found HERE

Extra credit reading: The Playbill

. Pictured L to R: Alex Keiper, Blake Hamilton Currie, Matt Bowdren, Amira Danan. Photo by Michael Brosilow.

All photos courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.

April 16, 2026

Milwaukee Rep’s Frida…A Self Portrait…In One Actor

In the first half of the 20th Century, male artists dominated the art scene just as they have done for centuries. Fortunately two woman artists of the Americas were able to break out of the patriarchy, Wisconsin’s own Georgia O’Keefe and Mexico’s Frida Kahlo. Certainly a major reason for their visibility is the remarkable artwork that they created which clearly still speaks to us today. But Kahlo is also intriguing not only because she was a landmark artist but because of the difficulties that she endured in her personal life.

And it is that endurance plus a personal spiritual connection to Kahlo that brought Vanessa Severo to write and perform Frida…A Self Portrait. Frida is directed by Joanie Schultz.

Vanessa Severo. Photo by Michael Brosilow and courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.

Fittingly for a play subtitled, an autobiography, there is only one actor, Vanessa Severo. So in essence, Frida gets to tell her own story. But don’t be fooled into thinking that with only one actor, that there is only one character on stage. The first one is prominent. It is Severo the playwright who in at least three different moments speaks to the audience directly and has Severo the actor explain the various whys and hows that brought this play about. There is enough drama in these interludes for an actual play on its own…but we really want to see and hear Frida.

And hear Frida, we do. She narrates her life story with all of its drama in a very engaging manner often telling us how she feels, how she perceived the events around her, and why she decided to do some of the things she did. All of the major events in her life are examined. Many of them in Frida’s own words but often with Frida ( or is it Severo, the lines are at times blurred), impersonating another character in costume or just in narration. It depends. Many many different people make an appearance but most importantly, there are major moments with her father Guillermo Kahlo and her husband Diego Rivera. These re-tellings and impersonations are fraught with drama and edged with humor, both in word and the visuals. Severo moves from one focus point to another in an uninhibited fluid dance that just dares you to look away for even a moment. Intriguing story telling at its finest.

Severo is intensely Frida Kahlo and you will suspend disbelief readily and accept that you are witnessing a private story from Frida.

The framing story is Frida entertaining a guest who is visiting to view the architecture of her home, La Casa Azul. But instead of concentrating on the history of the house, Frida wanders off in her mind and recounts the key memory points in her life. The simple set aids the flow and ebb in the story telling. Overhead and to the rear, the general set is a four poster bed that is key to the backstory as Frida spent many days in bed recuperating from one injury to another. And after Severo finishes her prologue to the audience, the stage is festooned by three clotheslines of clothing and bedding that have been questioningly lying on the stage until Severo begins as Frida. These clothes provide the costuming and decor needed for different characters and environments as the story proceeds and Severo discards them stage left or right as their utility vanishes. And there are some stories that remain unspoken…but are told via Severo’s interactions with individual items, lighting, and sound. Some of these moments are particularly sad and should remain unspoken.

Besides the settings, the story is subtly enhanced but the background sounds including insects chirping, city street noises, and such. Very nice, thank you Thomas Dixon. And with just one actor on stage, lighting is very important to help tell the story and to lead the audiences focus and to set the mood and timbre of a scene. Hats off to Rachel Cady.

Frida…A Self Portrait runs about 80 minutes without an intermission.

Frida is being presented in the Herro-Franke Studio Theater at the Milwaukee Rep from now through May 17, 2026. More details and ticket information here.

Extra Credit Reading: Program

March 9, 2026

Celebrating Fats Waller With Ain’t Misbehavin’: And The Joint Is Jumpin’

The Milwaukee Repertory Theater is celebrating the music of Fats Waller with an ensemble presentation of over 30 of his songs in the Stackner Cabaret. And if you don’t have fun, it’s your own dang fault.

Pictured Amahri Edwards-Jones and Jarran V. Muse Photo by Michael Brosilow. Photo Courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.

Yes, indeed, Director E. Faye Butler has put together a solid ensemble of performers and then given them the room to move: sing, vamp, tease, and perform like there is no tomorrow but like they’ve been doing this forever. And Choreographer Kenneth E. Ingram weighs in with on stage moves that delight and allow the cast to swing, jump, jitterbug, waltz, etc in any number of ways that enhance the stories in Waller’s songs.

And it is the stories in the songs that drive this play…so some numbers are full on ensemble pieces but many break down into duets or solo pieces, and Butler and Ingram make those changes and shifts fluid and essentially invisible to the audience, but Lighting Designer Maaz Ahmed, knows just where to light and whom to light and what lights are best for the mood of the piece being performed. That helps draw cleanly the audience along the story lines.

Pictured L to R: Brad Raymond, Rae Davenport, Amahri Edwards-Jones, Katherine Alexis Thomas, Jarran V. Muse. Photo by Michael Brosilow. Photo courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.

And on to the ensemble/cast: We have five outstanding performers, and again I have to give credit to Butler for pulling together these strong singers and strong personas and making it feel like family on stage. Our cast is Rae Davenport, Amahri Edwards-Jones, Jarran Muse, Brad Raymond, and Katherine Alexis Thomas. And in fact they do feel like family particularly when they are teasing or kidding around with each other. Now you will notice that there aren’t any roles assigned to our five here. That’s because their roles and relationships shift and mutate as they progress through the Waller songbook. So as the stories shift and as we transition from one song to the next, the roles they are playing shift as well. But all of them can move from shy to coy to flirty to sexy to sultry to seductive to suggestive to elegant and back again depending on what they are singing about. And where are they performing? Well, from speakeasy to fancy nightclub to downtown at the Waldorf to a radio station studio (WMKE is back on the air YKIYK) and back with just a bit of vaudeville thrown in.

Pictured L to R: Amahri Edwards-Jones, Rae Davenport, Katherine Alexis Thomas. Photo by Michael Brosilow. Photo courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.

Our three women, Davenport, Edwards-Jones, and Thomas are fearless and willing to use their entire range. So at times they are in solid aria mode, full throated with vibrato in full display but when the mood calls for it, they aren’t afraid to go high to the point of break up and brittle to make a comedic point! And the men, Muse and Raymond, are willing to go that route too from fill the room to a bit up there from confidence and swagger to vocal eye-rolls and laughter. Raymond and Edward-Jones in particular are our comedic foils, just watching them move is a delight.

Pictured William Foster McDaniel. Photo by Michael Brosilow. Photo courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.

But none of this would work without the solid piano work of William Foster McDaniel. This 85 year old musical conductor and keyboard phenom is front and center on a grand (pun intended) sounding upright piano that so perfectly projects McDaniel’s playing . Piano is the only accompaniment and McDaniel is flawless and totally in tune with the music, working without sheet music. The Rep is lucky to have him…he’s been conducting or performing Ain’t Misbehavin’ for quite a while now, all across the country.

Spoiler alert: As we move into the finale, the cast gets to step out of character just a bit and instead of lyrics, gets to scat perform as different jazz musical instruments. It’s a lot of fun.

Now, most of these songs are nearing 100 years old, so the lyrics may seem dated and at times the content is defined by its place and time in America’s musical history…but there is nothing but happy here.

And now for a personal sartorial decision: fedora or bowler. I think the bowler…

Ain’t Misbehavin’ will be presented in the Stackner Cabaret from now through April 26, 2026. Additional information and tickets can be found here.

Extra Credit Reading: The Program