Sapulpa Community Theatre is turning on its stage lights once again after months of sitting in the dark.
The theatre is starting the year with a twist on its usual show. Instead of the usual fanfare, the audience will be treated to “The Fate of Fairchild Farm – or Be It Ever So Mortgaged, There’s No Place Like Home,” an old-fashioned melodrama that encourages audience members to cheer the heroes and boo the villains. The show will be played by two separate casts and will run two full weekends starting May 14th, and then will run every Saturday night through the end of June.
President-Emeritus Debbie Pope said the new direction is an exciting turn of events for the theatre. “We knew we couldn’t financially just let the building remain dark. Utilities, insurance, etc., still need paying and we needed to get back to bringing in some income,” she said. “We decided to take a step back to our roots and perform a good old-fashioned melodrama.”
As of September of last year, the theatre wasn’t sure when—or even if—it would get back to a regular season of shows when the Coronavirus pandemic shut down most events and in-person gatherings. The 2020 season was cut in half when “Flowers For Algernon” had to be canceled in the spring due to lockdowns. An amended showing of “Agatha Christie’s Black Coffee” was scheduled for the following September at a reduced capacity, and though the turnout was solid, it wasn’t possible to put on a show to a reduced crowd and still pay the bills, so the board of directors reluctantly decided to cancel the rest of the 2020 season, hoping for better circumstances in 2021.
Pope says that the theatre will not return to a full season of shows until 2022. “We hope this step back in time will be well-received,” she said. The theatre says it will honor any unredeemed shows for the 2019 season ticket holder.
Tickets for the show will remain $12 for adults and $5 for students through 12th grade. Seating will be limited. Masks are encouraged, but not required. Book tickets at sapulpatheatre.org
