This story originally appeared in our Sept. 30 – Oct. 13, 2026 print edition. Check out the edition online here and find where you can get a print edition near you here.

The 1960s was an era of fondly remembered tumult with an iconic musical soundtrack. Whether you lived then or simply love the songs it spawned, you should head to downtown Cincinnati’s Aronoff Center on Friday evening, Oct. 16, for an award-winning theatrical production: “The Sixties Show.” 

Craig O’Keefe, the show’s co-founder, producer and artistic director, calls his show, “the greatest 1960s musical recreation show on Earth. We’re not part of the tribute world. Our show isn’t nostalgia. It’s a transmission — history at full volume.” Offering authentic music backed by archival video footage and storytelling, the immersive performance transports audiences back to the music, the politics and the pop culture of that momentous decade.

O’Keefe and co-creator Tom Licameli, veterans of the New York and Los Angeles music scenes, created the show as an off-Broadway theatrical production more than a decade ago. In a recent phone interview with CityBeat, O’Keefe recalled early engagements in small clubs — just two or three attendees in their very first outing — that now fill larger clubs and midsized theaters across the United States. Still building thanks to popular demand, “The Sixties Show” now routinely plays to sold-out venues from coast to coast. The stop at the Aronoff is the show’s first visit to Cincinnati. It has often had return engagements in many U.S. cities. A longer run could happen soon in New York or Chicago, and a trip to London is in the works for 2027.

O’Keefe called his show “a time trip back to the 1960s with live, note-for-note recreations of music from the era. There’s no recorded backing, just our own voices and our own musical abilities. It is decidedly not simply a nostalgia tribute act.”

“The Sixties Show” is anchored by a powerhouse lineup of six musicians, including O’Keefe, who serves as the show’s musical director and plays bass. He has toured with Stone Temple Pilots, Oasis, Sublime, Weezer, Daryl Hall, The Smashing Pumpkins, Dave Edmunds and Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons. He played bass for Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductees The Rascals on their 60th Anniversary Tour.

O’Keefe joked, “I was barely out of diapers at the end of the ’60s.” All the show’s musicians were, in fact, born in that decade, but each one has deep experience with legendary musicians including Paul McCartney, Mick Jagger, The Who, The Beach Boys, Bruce Springsteen, Steely Dan and the Saturday Night Live Band. Joining O’Keefe for the show are co-founder Licameli, guitar and bass; Jim Boggia, guitar and ukulele; Kevin Bents, keyboards, guitar and bass; Jeff Miller, keyboards; and drummer Scott Devours. Most of them also provide the show’s vocals. The Sixties Show setlist includes hits by The Beatles, The Beach Boys, The Doors, The Kinks, The Byrds, Cream, The Rolling Stones, Bee Gees and The Dave Clark Five. 

O’Keefe’s main musical hero from the era is Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys. “He did the whole thing, the sounds, the arrangements. He did it all.” One of O’Keefe’s favorite albums is The Beach Boys’ “Pet Sounds.” He also admires “Strange Days” by The Doors, “Village Green” by The Kinks and “Led Zeppelin II.”

“We do the great ’60s songs note-for-note, with guitars and amps from the era along with our period multimedia and light show. We put together a great quality show. Our band members are really into this. We don’t play any song we don’t love and do great. We kill the songs we do,” he said. 

“The Sixties Show” band uses no backing tracks, no pre-recorded samples, no pre-recorded audio of any kind. Every number is played entirely live. The musicians use 1960s vintage guitars, keyboards and other instruments to match the original recordings. 

“We sound just like the vinyls for our high-energy trip to the ’60s,” O’Keefe said. 

The set, backed by multiple projection screens, resembles an old TV studio, scattered with nostalgic items such as a VW Beetle and a Microbus, an image of an Apollo astronaut space suit.

Attired in “Mod” styles to underscore the show’s time-travel aspect, the performers use narration to sustain momentum. “We keep it light, never get political,” O’Keefe explained. It’s a chance to learn about — or recall — the ’60s, a great deal of knowledge in a very entertaining way. 

Audience response has been overwhelmingly positive from Boomers who lived through the era as well as more recent fans from generations X, Y and Z. They all describe the show as an emotional, transporting trip back in time.

O’Keefe pointed out, “People are amazed that we’re actually playing live music — every single note we play is done live. We recreate the intricate harmonies and melodies, every note is correct. We love this decade.” He underscored, “This is not a nostalgia tribute act. It’s a concert, it’s time-travel … and it’s unforgettable.”

The show is part of the Cincinnati Arts Association’s “CAA Presents” 2026-27 Season. Tickets: www.CincinnatiArts.org or 513-621-2787. (Group sales of 10 or more should call 513-977-4155.)

The post Musical Time Travel: The Sixties Show appeared first on Cincinnati CityBeat.

Theaters in the Cincy area have a robust mix of shows and musicals in August. Keep reading to learn about some of the shows we’re looking forward to, along with ticketing info and logistics. 

The Complete Works of Jane Austen (Abridged)

Next to playwright William Shakespeare, the British writer likely most beloved is early 19th-century novelist Jane Austen. So it seems only fitting that she’s getting gently poked fun at by Cincinnati Shakespeare Company this month with the local premiere of “The Complete Works of Jane Austen (Abridged).”

Written and first produced in 2019, it’s a fast-paced, respectful and affectionate parody by Jessica Bradford, Kathryn MacMillan, Charlotte Northeast and Meghan Winch — a quartet of actors, directors and dramaturgs.

Jenny Lavery, who’s staging the show for Cincy Shakes, recently spoke with CityBeat about the show. It’s a co-production with Merrimack Repertory Theatre in Lowell, Massachusetts, where she’s currently the interim artistic director. It will be remounted at Merrimack in November and December. 

The brief, one-act script offers chaotic, witty and affectionate mashups of Austen’s six novels (“Sense and Sensibility,” “Pride and Prejudice,” “Mansfield Park,” “Emma,” “Northanger Abbey” and “Persuasion”) and countless romances wrapped in incisive social satire. It’s done with just three nimble actors —Cincy Shakes’ veterans Hannah Gregory, Jasimine Bouldin and Patrick Earl Phillips.

The sustaining joke of the play is that, when a cast member abruptly goes missing, the remaining two must teach an understudy the entire Austen canon on the fly. Lavery noted that the four playwrights were all “Janeites,” a name coined in 1894 by a British literary critic for Austen’s committed fans. Today there are numerous active chapters across England and the U.S., including in Cincinnati and Dayton.

“One of the attributes of the Janeite community is this banter and this love for witty sparring with one another about which book is better, why it’s better and why the other person is wrong,” Lavery said. 

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A lot of the jokes, she said, were borrowed directly from the Janeite community. 

“The characters in the play also hold some of the most well-known Janeite [attitudes],” Lavery said. “One is more of a romantic caught up with Darcy and the loves, the dresses and the movies and all of those things. The other one is more of a purist — she’s a stickler for the fact, for the heightened language, the poeticism. She read the books in the order they were written. Between the two different characters, we cover a lot of ground.”

The character played by Phillips is a newcomer to Austen. Lavery described him as a keyhole for the newbies or the plus-ones in the audience who aren’t as familiar with Austen’s work. 

“That addition of him is important because it allows them to do more palatable takes on every book,” Lavery said. “He becomes the one who asks all the dumb questions that people in the audience, even if you’ve read all her books, might be asking as well.”

Asked to describe the show’s appeal, Lavery called it a fast and fun and joyous 80-minute experience that stays true to the text. 

“For people who don’t know, there’s a lot to be gleaned about how wild and progressive and ahead of her time Jane Austen was and kind of still is,” Lavery said. “Her writing is pretty radical even for right now. The hope is that maybe people will go read one of her books for the first time or revisit one read long ago.”

La Cage aux Folles

The Carnegie in Covington has established itself as a go-to venue for productions, especially when teamed with talent from the University of Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music. Musical theater director Rachel Stevens, a CCM professor, is staging “La Cage aux Folles.” It’s onstage Aug. 14-23.

The 1996 film “The Birdcage” was based on the original play and musical, featuring Robin Williams and Nathan Lane. 

“La Cage aux Folles” was the first hit Broadway musical to depict a gay relationship, receiving a Tony Award in 1983. It’s about middle-aged Albin, a drag performer, and Georges, the owner of a posh gay night club in St. Tropez. It’s been a crowd-pleaser for decades, with a tuneful score by Jerry Herman and a riotously funny book by Harvey Fierstein. 

Josh Walden, playing Albin, appeared as a Cagelle, the star performer at the club in the show’s 2004 revival. An accomplished director, choreographer and educator, Walden recently served as artist-in-residence for CCM in 2025. Several CCM musical theater students are in the cast.

One hour before each Carnegie performance, audiences are invited to step into an immersive preshow experience that transports them into the nightclub and highlights local queer talent. The Carnegie’s galleries and public spaces will be transformed into an extension of the titular nightclub.

Crazy for you

“Crazy for You” by George and Ira Gershwin is showing at the Warsaw Federal Incline Theatre in Price Hill starting Aug. 8.

One of Cincinnati’s best local theater artists, Dee Anne Bryll, will direct a cast of 20, in a compendium of tunes by the brothers, composed in the 1920s and ’30s. A city slicker falls for a hometown girl in this zany, ebullient romantic comedy featuring cowboys, show girls and high-energy production numbers. 

First produced on Broadway in 1992, this light-hearted show won three Tony Awards, including Best Musical. 

We Will Rock You

Music by British rockers Queen is the score for “We Will Rock You,” featuring music by Queen at Memorial Hall in Over-the-Rhine for two days in late August. 

Broadway veteran Lesley Goddard will direct and choreograph Queen’s fist-pumping, foot-stomping title number, plus more than 20 Queen hits, such as “We Are the Champions” and “Bohemian Rhapsody.” The lightly staged production is put on by a cast of 17, including Bethany Xan Kerr, Rory Sheridan and Billy Chace (a regular with Cincy Shakes). A five-musician band led by CCM conductor Steve Goers accompanies the stage production. 

Originally produced in London, “We Will Rock You” had a 12-year run there (2002-2014). It’s been performed in 28 countries worldwide. 

The post From a Jane Austen parody to the musical that inspired The Birdcage, don’t miss these August shows appeared first on Cincinnati CityBeat.

This story originally appeared in our July 8-21 print edition. Check out the edition online here and find where you can get a print edition near you here.

Theater fans in Greater Cincinnati have to be a bit more diligent to find onstage entertainment during the summer months when many of the region’s theaters are dark. Cincinnati Shakespeare Company isn’t one of them, however, according to Artistic Director Brian Phillips.

When he began his tenure as Cincy Shakes’ leader two decades ago, the company faced an annual budgetary challenge: with a season beginning in September, revenue from ticket sales often were not quite enough to sustain operations through the year’s end. Phillips decided to launch a summertime show — initially “The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged)” to get the ball rolling. 

“That enabled the company to have more financial stability, and it built an audience for us.” Phillips said. “We know we’re competing with a lot of events in Cincinnati — Reds, festivals and so on — it’s obvious that “Long Day’s Journey into Night” is not going to be a draw during the summer months. We look for plays that are funny, that are shorter, get people out before the sun is completely gone. It’s lighter fare to keep spirits up and keep the laughs coming.” 

From July 10 to 25,  the company will present its latest light-hearted summer offering, a brand-new comedy titled “Dogberry and Verges Are Scared.” It’s a buddy comedy with Shakespearean roots, developed by actors Michael Doherty and Will Mobley. Its inspiration is the two bumbling constables from the Bard’s “Much Ado About Nothing,” a pair who are regularly and comically frightened by the prospect of real danger. Cincy Shakes has played a key part in developing this script, which gets its world premiere on the company’s Over-the-Rhine mainstage. 

Back in early 2023, Doherty and Mobley were cast as Dogberry and Verges in a production of “Much Ado” at Milwaukee Repertory Theatre. They hit it off immediately, according to Mobley’s account of their first rehearsal together. 

“Someone came up to us after that read-through and asked how long have you guys been working together? We were like, well, we met five minutes ago,” he said. “Our synergy was just so clear from the beginning. Looking back, it seems like it was inevitable that we would make something together and specifically something so funny.”

Mobley subsequently met Cincy Shakes’ Phillips during a visit to Utah Shakespeare Festival. He described the project to Phillips, who was interested in giving it a tryout in Cincinnati. That led to a 2024 developmental workshop, andCincy Shakes eventually became the show’s co-producer with Mobley and Doherty, who established Slippery Trout Productions, their amusingly named fledgling production company. 

Their script had a test run in September 2025 during the Philadelphia Fringe Festival, where Doherty had mounted a show several years earlier. A pair of veteran Philadelphia actors—Scott Greer and Tony Lawton—were cast as the inept clowns, and several Cincy Shakes regulars were part of the show: Jeremy Dubin, Elizabeth Chinn Molloy and Courtney Lucien. Philadelphia director Matthew Dexter staged it, supported by an artistic team from Cincinnati. The upcoming performances at Cincy Shakes’ Otto M. Budig Theater will feature the same cast and team, but with more fully expanded staging. After that, they will pack everything up and head off for a month of performances throughout August at the famous Edinburgh Fringe in Scotland. 

Asked why the playwrights aren’t themselves playing the title roles they created, Doherty said, “It’s kind of like a little gift we’re giving to others like Scott and Tony. They’re excited to do things in this play that clowns really drool over. It was awesome to involve people of their stock.”

Mobley and Doherty are grateful to be working with Phillips and the team. 

“We can’t say enough about the Cincinnati folks, not only the actors, but our stage manager and the design team,” Doherty said. “Everyone from Cincinnati has not only been incredibly kind and talented, but also super game for whatever comes their way. We feel so lucky to have them help bring our play to life.” 

“Dogberry and Verges Are Scared” resembles other legendary shows with comic leads whose interactions transcend humor, like Tom Stoppard’s “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead” or Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot.” 

“When you set that up as an expectation, as we do with our play and the title, to then have fart jokes will cause people to have whiplash from what they’re expecting,” Doherty said. “At the same time, using what we think is pretty sophisticated wordplay, pathos and emotional vulnerability is really exciting for comedic actors.” 

Mobley said the play is “definitely a comedy with a capital C.”

“But we have worked really hard to weave in some weightier substance: themes of forgiveness and friendship, and explorations of what it means to be in a relationship with someone and have doubts and fears and what it means to hold onto those or let go,” he said. 

The two didn’t build their play to deliver a heavy-handed lesson, however. 

“When I see a play that tries to educate me, my eyes kind of glaze over. Mike and I say that we’ve always found it more successful when a play sort of sneaks some of that stuff in a little surreptitiously. I want to be very clear that this is a very, very silly play. But we sneak in some heart and some pathos, and everyone will leave the theater having a really well-rounded experience,” Mobley said. 

For anyone wanting a refresher for (or an introduction to) “Much Ado About Nothing,” Cincy Shakes’ free Shakespeare in the Park series will present the classic comedy in regional parks across the Tri-State, starting in mid-July and continuing through early September. Now in its 20th year, the company’s park productions — portable and shortened, but authentically Shakespearean — reach audiences that don’t often come downtown to see productions at the company’s Over-the-Rhine theater. While “Dogberry and Verges” will feature in Elizabethan-era costuming, the “Much Ado” tour — in keeping with the celebration of America’s 250th celebration — sets the story of the sparring skeptical lovers Beatrice and Benedick in post-Revolutionary War America in 1776. 

“We take Shakespeare to many parks and different communities, so geography is not a barrier, cost is not a barrier, and the text is not a barrier because we do a really great job of staging the show. It’s very accessible to audiences,” Phillips said.

For tickets to “Dogberry and Verges Are Scared” or to check out the calendar of free park performances of “Much Ado About Nothing,” go to www.cincyshakes.com.

Elsewhere in July, there’s a production of the highly entertaining musical tribute “Always … Patsy Cline” at Cincinnati Landmark Productions’ Warsaw Federal Incline Theatre (July 8 to Aug. 2). The show offers a heartwarming portrait of friendship and an evening of music by one of the all-time great country singers. Tickets: 513-241-6550 

At The Carnegie in Covington “Murder for Two” will have a brief run (July 22 to 26). It’s an uproarious, fast-paced, 90-minute musical by two performers, a whodunit paying tribute to classic murder mysteries. One actor plays the detective while the other impersonates 13 suspects; both of them play the piano. Tickets: thecarnegie.com/whats-on/murder-fortwo 

The annual summer production by Cincinnati Young People’s Theatre, featuring kids ages 14 to 19, will be Disney’s “Newsies” at the Covedale Center for the Performing Arts (July 23 to Aug. 2). For more than four decades, Cincinnati Landmark Productions has presented performances for, of and by area teenagers. “Newsies,” set in early 20th-century New York City, tells the story of a charismatic newsboy who rallies others from across the city to strike against unfair conditions and fight for what’s right. Tickets: 513-241-6550

The post Shakin’ in the Summertime: Clowns, lovers, parks and more appeared first on Cincinnati CityBeat.

The 23rd Annual Cincinnati Fringe Festival comes back this month, May 29-June 13, presenting an outrageous assortment of one-hour, live performances by more than 35 independent local, national and international artists in pop-up venues around Over-the-Rhine. 

This year’s primary lineup of 25 productions features new work from 13 local creators, 10 productions from across the U.S. and two international artists from Canada and Australia. More than 160 ticketed events will use theater, art, music, dance, puppetry, clowning and whatever might land in between. 

Katie Hartman, producer for five years, calls Cincy Fringe really special. 

“It’s a festival where artists and patrons mix and mingle in Know Theatre’s Underground Bar (1120 Jackson Street, OTR),” Hartman said. “There’s a party there every night after shows conclude.” 

Ingrid Garner Back from Orange County, Calif., returns for her third appearance. In 2024 and 2025 in her solo show, “Eleanor’s Story,” she performed as her grandmother, who lived in Germany during World War II. Garner earned “Pick of the Fringe” recognition in 2025. 

For 2026, she’s conceived something quite different: the world premiere of “A Hollywood Horror Story,” the wild and true story behind TV’s first horror host, Vampira, an overnight sensation in 1954.

“Before I did ‘Eleanor’s Story,’ I was doing stage adaptations of bad ‘B’ movies — ‘Night of the Living Dead’ and ‘Plan 9 from Outer Space,’” Garner said in a recent interview. “In the latter, she played Vampira, originated by actress Maija Nurmi.” 

Vampira has been a passion of Garner’s since she was cast as the character in 2012. 

“She was at a peak of fame for one year in 1954, just like the hottest thing on Earth,” Garner said. “A year later she ended up starring in what would become one of the worst films of all time, ‘Plan 9,’ by director Ed Wood.”

Why Cincy Fringe? 

“Because a lot of folks premiere shows at the Cincy Fringe,” Garner said. “It’s always been talked about by artists in such a loving way. Everyone expresses how magical it is — a smaller festival that’s curated, and an audience that’s very dedicated and willing to try anything.” 

Garner came to Cincinnati last October for an under-the-radar tryout during a “Weird Cabaret” event produced by another Fringe regular, Erika Kate MacDonald. 

“No one really knew, even the other artists,” Garner said, “until I stepped out onstage and premiered the first 20 minutes of this show. Erika and the Cincy Fringe are why the show exists now.”

Nurmi was a onetime model, nightclub coat-check attendant and necktie painter. Her Vampira costume for a 1954 Halloween party was inspired by the wicked witch in “Sleeping Beauty” and Charles Addams’s “Morticia.” She had a waspish hourglass figure, creepy fingernails and long, sleek black hair. A Los Angeles TV executive cast her as the host of late-night horror films. Her brief eight-month run earned a five-page photo spread in Life magazine.

Garner thinks of Nurmi as the “grandmother of punk,” someone who inspired hippies, goths, punks and Sci-Fi nerds. 

“I kind of view her as this alien sent down to Earth to save the earthlings from the fate of 1950s conformity,” Garner said. “Her life was about making fun of the ideals of ’50s femininity.”

“Hollywood Horror Story” is both a story about Nurmi’s life and the creation of Vampira. 

“Literally anybody will see themselves in this show,” Garner said. “It’s delivered as an episode of the “Vampira” show. In fact, we’re sort of screening the narrative of Maila Nurmi’s life, the woman who played Vampira, sort of a real-life Cinderella-meets-Frankenstein story. 

“In the first 20 minutes, I play Maila, going through her early life and the influences that would eventually inspire Vampira. I do the transformation onstage into the character until we have our lab scene. It’s really a story of creator and creation, itself such a B movie trope.”

In addition to portraying Nurmi as Vampira in “A Hollywood Horror Story,” Garner uses video and her own acting transformations to bring in others who influenced Nurmi — including horror stars Bela Lugosi and Lon Chaney Jr. — who Garner called the actor’s “ghoul gang.”

“I think she was a lot braver than I ever was,” Garner said. “I always kind of considered myself a ‘plain-clothes’ goth. But I’ve always been kind of a morbid and macabre person with a very dark sense of humor. I didn’t always love horror films. I was a fearful person most of my life, but I remember thinking as a kid, if I could just be scarier than anything that could crawl through my window, I would feel safe.”

Garner loved how Nurmi adopted Snow White’s evil queen as a role model. She saw her as a confident, self-assured woman. 

“For me, that’s Vampira, that’s Maila — she was definitely very Jekyll/Hyde and a lot more bold and really punk rock more than I am,” Garner said. “It’s really time for Vampira to come back into the zeitgeist. She has truly influenced so many aspects of our culture today. You recognize her in all the images that came before her, like the evil queen and Norma Desmond in “Sunset Boulevard,” and you recognize her in the punks and goths you saw later. It’s time to see how this all came about and how she brought it all together. I hope I do it justice.”

A few more Cincy Fringe shows worth considering: Madeline Rowe’s “Papa” is a portrait of Frankenstein’s monster, not just a creation — but somebody’s son. Bruce Ryan Costella’s “Rat Man Happy Place” is a dystopian tour through the ruins of what was once Disney World. Australian Jon Bennett will present “This Will Only Ever Happen Once.” A Fringe favorite, Bennett recreates some of life’s unrepeatable moments. Two2Mango from Toronto will perform “Colonial Circus: History, Clown Style,” featuring a pair of Indian clowns who make fun of colonialism and the way white people characterize history.

Click here for tickets: www.CincyFringe.com

Also happening in Over-the-Rhine during the Fringe Festival, The Children’s Theatre of Cincinnati will present “Doodle POP!” at the newly restored Emery Theater (1112 Walnut Street), June 4–7. This whimsical visual theater experience from South Korea combines live performance, stunning projection effects, imaginative storytelling and larger-than-life creativity in a nonverbal adventure that audiences of all ages can enjoy. 

An international hit praised for its inventive visual style and playful energy, “Doodle POP!” invites audiences into a colorful world where drawings come to life in surprising and magical ways. It will extensively use TCT’s technologically advanced venue for a dazzling experience for kids 3-12. Performances on June 4, 5 and 6. Click here for tickets: www.TheChildrensTheatre.com.

Touring productions of “The Lion King” have played to sold-out venues across the United States and around the world for three decades. It returns to downtown Cincinnati’s Aronoff Center this month for its fourth visit (June 10 to July 5). The show has been a theatrical hit since its Broadway debut in 1997. Winner of six Tony Awards, including one for Best Musical and another for Best Direction of a Musical. 

“The Lion King’s” imaginative musical stage version, designed and conceived by Tony winner Julie Taymor, is the real deal: actors in animal costumes as well as large puppets have charmed audiences for three decades. Previous Cincinnati presentations happened in 2003, 2015 and 2020, just before the COVID pandemic shut down theaters everywhere. It’s an awe-inspiring piece of stagecraft, well worth seeing. For tickets call 513-621-2787 or visit: https://www.cincinnatiarts.org/events/official-ticket-source.

Another recent Broadway hit, “Dear Evan Hansen,” will be produced by The Carnegie in Covington (June 19-28). Winner of the 2017 Tony Award for Best Musical, it’s about an angsty teen who uses social media to invent a role for himself after a classmate’s suicide.

He gets undeserved credit for something he didn’t do. Ultimately an uplifting story about connecting and belonging, this is a good show about the importance of empathy for families with teens. The Carnegie, which is located at 1028 Scott Blvd., has built a solid reputation for well staged musical productions and has assembled talented cast for this production. For tickets call 859-957-1940.

The post ‘Magical’ Cincinnati Fringe Festival is back  appeared first on Cincinnati CityBeat.

“Do you remember a summer when you thought everything was possible?”

That was the question D. Lynn Meyers, producing artistic director at Ensemble Theatre’s May 2026 production of “The House on Watch Hill,” posed when announcing the production.

Ensemble Theatre will premiere this show by Cincinnati native and Broadway composer Richard Oberacker and his writing partner Robert Taylor. It’s about a group of teen misfits in the summer of 1984 who set out to build the ultimate haunted house in the Anderson Township suburb of Cincinnati.

Oberacker, a graduate of Anderson High School (as well as the University of Cincinnati’s College Conservatory of Music), was the kid who led his geeky friends for a project that stirred up fears far more real than any ghost story. Their show captures the bittersweet moment between childhood and growing up, a time when you’re old enough to know the world is scary but brave enough to face it anyway.

“The best way Rob and I have found to describe the show is that it’s like “The Breakfast Club” (1985) meets “Stand by Me” (1986) with about a cup-and-a-half of the Netflix series “Stranger Things” (2016-2025),” Oberacker said in a conversation with CityBeat. “All those pieces continue to resonate in pop culture.”

Asked what might set their show apart, Oberacker said there isn’t any other music like it.

“When we first started working on it and sharing it with a few trusted people, everyone said, ‘I’ve never read anything like this before,'” he said. But in truth, “the scariest thing isn’t the haunted house—it’s growing up.” 

“The House on Watch Hill” is based on real events, Oberacker said, that happened here in Cincinnati with a group of young teenage friends.

“Social misfits, theater kids, gadget kid, the total nerd, the artist, the rich girl, the one Asian kid in Anderson High School, the one Black girl in Anderson High School,” he said. They persuaded a neighbor to take over the entire basement of her suburban home.

“We spent the summer building a neighborhood haunted house,” Oberacker said. “But what we really spent the summer doing was coming into ourselves, growing up. It’s a coming-of-age story … What they go through during this summer—falling in love, getting out of love, losing a parent—all the things that we dealt with as kids trying to get to the other side of puberty.”

Steeped in Cold War anxiety and latchkey freedom, “The House on Watch Hill” promises to be funny, moving and maybe just a little spooky. 

Oberacker and Taylor’s script is firmly rooted in 1984 Cincinnati.

“Anderson High School is name-checked,” Oberacker said. “McNicholas High School is name-checked. The Friendly’s on Beechmont Avenue, no longer there, is where we used to hang out. The Skywalk Cinema downtown where we first saw ‘Rocky Horror Picture Show’ is name-checked.”

There are many other local references.

“The show is 100% a love letter to my childhood in the city,” Oberacker said. “The musical is full of these granular details of real life in Cincinnati in 1984. It’s not a mythic, faraway place.”

Oberacker, today a composer and conductor with Cirque du Soleil in Las Vegas, has crafted an ’80s-inspired soundtrack.

“I really wanted it to sound like the ’80s,” he said. “Kate Bush, Annie Lenox and the Eurythmics. The architecture of the melodies, the chord changes are in the style of those artists. Depeche Mode figures very heavily.”

He also developed music resembling numbers by the synth-pop band A-ha , as well as early Madonna and Cyndi Lauper. Those iconic reverbs and chords will be shaped by veteran sound designer Brian Hsieh for ETC.

“It’s really going to transport you back to the time with my songs,” Oberacker said. “The melodies in pop music at that time were very bold and very catchy. The score feels like it’s of the time.”

Meyers, who will co-direct the show with Dee Anne Bryll, said the show is about stripping away the layers of who we become and going back to a time when we were still dreaming and hoping for the future.

She calls the music “intoxicating. Once you jump in, the rhythm just keeps going throughout the whole piece. These songs could have been hits of the 80s had they been written during that time.”

Several music demos were recorded in New York  with a professional cast of Broadway kids. They are available on Oberacker’s YouTube channel.

In addition to seven teen actors, the cast includes two mature players as “The Adults in the Room.”

Oberacker said they enable the generations to look at one another and discover common ground.

“It’s really electric and special,” he said of a 2023 workshop production in Las Vegas. “It transcends the story we are telling and what it means to go on this journey from childhood into adulthood.”

He hopes high school kids find the show at Ensemble as they did in the Vegas workshop, which was extended several times.

“I want them to know that there’s a show happening here in Cincinnati that’s about what they’re going through right now,” Oberacker said. “I was one of those kids!”

Other theater productions in May

Falcon Theater in Newport presents Kate Douglas’s “The Apiary” (May 1-16), directed by Chad Brinkman. Set 22 years in the future, honeybees are nearly extinct except for a few kept alive inside labs, where several dedicated women try to rehabilitate the bee population. When an unexpected incident boosts the bee population, hard decisions have to be made. This unsettling and sharp-witted cautionary tale warns that the key to protecting each other and the planet is right in front of us, if only we would listen. Tickets: 513-479-6783

Broadway in Cincinnati will present a five-day run of the touring production of “Suffs” (May 12-17) at the Aronoff Center. Make plans to catch see this tuneful portrait of the activists who fought for the 19th Amendment to the Constitution to give American women the right to vote in 1920. In 2026, when women are likely to be a decisive factor in our midterm elections, this Tony Award-winning show is an essential reminder of what our democracy is about. Click here to purchase tickets.

Cincinnati Shakespeare Company will take audiences into the world and time of romance novelist Jane Austen via a witty stage adaptation of “Emma” by playwright Kate Hamill (May 22-June 14). It’s the story of a headstrong matchmaker who believes she can’t possibly fall in love, but who orchestrates romance for those around her with hilarious results. This clever and charming take will be directed by Candice Handy featuring a completely Black cast of professional actors, including Torie Wiggins, Burgess Byrd, Samuel Stricklen and Ernaisja Curry as Emma. Tickets: 513-381-2273

On Saturday evening, May 30, 6-11 p.m., the Young Professionals Choral Collective (YPCC) will present its annual gala fundraiser at the Netherland Plaza’s beautiful Art Deco Hall of Mirrors, one of Cincinnati’s most iconic venues. The evening’s program, Sing the Queen City, will feature renditions of Broadway show tunes and anthems by Andrew Lloyd Webber, Stephen Schwarts, Stephen Sondheim and many more, sung by a well-rehearsed chorus of 142 voices in collaboration with Sarah Folsom and Matthew Umphreys, a duo who perform vintage jazz and pop songs as Queen City Cabaret. The evening begins with a pre-concert dinner. Click here to purchase tickets.

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There were numerous excellent theater productions during 2025 on Cincinnati stages. CityBeat writers single out several they found that were especially memorable.

Primary Trust, Feb. 1-23, 2025, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park

Since winning the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, Eboni Booth’s Primary Trust has been one of the most produced plays in the country. In an era of extreme incivility, Booth creates a lovely world populated with sweet, thoughtful characters. The strong Playhouse cast featured DeShawn Harold Mitchell and Shane Taylor admirably supported by chameleons Lilian Oben and Peter Bisgaier inhabiting multiple roles. The set embodied the magic and whimsy of the story. The kindness of these characters helped Kenneth along on his journey to adapt to unexpected changes and find his place in a challenging world. Watching him connect with his new coworkers and neighbors generated much laughter and a few tears. When Kenneth says, “I don’t believe in God or Heaven or Hell, but I do believe in friends,” it’s impossible to disagree. (Julie Carpenter)

English, March 1–30, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park

On its intimate Shelterhouse stage, the Playhouse’s production of Sanaz Toossi’s 2023 Pulitzer Prize-winning play portrayed four Iranian citizens struggling to develop fluency in a difficult foreign language, English. Their patient teacher, with her own set of concerns about her nationality and her language, connected with each of them. Her students had individual reasons to become certified by TOEFL, the “Test of English as a Foreign Language.” Toosi’s ingenious script had them speak halting English as they sought proficiency, often shifting into fluent, conversational English during moments of frustration. The story had no singular dramatic moment; rather the personal arcs of each character revealed basic human needs — a qualification for a job, a generational family connection, a desire to appreciate pop culture — that audience members could fully relate to. This thoughtful 95-minute play used warmth and engagement to explore how personal identity is embedded in the language we speak. (Rick Pender)

A Room in the Castle, March 4-April 6, Cincinnati Shakespeare Company

Shakespeare’s Hamlet found its way twice into Cincy Shakes’ season, from a 2024 summer touring production and a fall staging of Fat Ham, James Ijames’s 2022 Pulitzer Prize winner, prior to staging this show by prolific American playwright Lauren Gunderson. Her 85-minute script was commissioned by Cincy Shakes and co-produced by Washington, D.C.’s venerable Folger Theatre. The three-character play was set in a room in Elsinore Castle: Manipulative Queen Gertrude (Oneika Phillips) advised Ophelia (Sabrina Lynne Sawyer), Hamlet’s on-again, off-again fiancée. A new character, Anna (Burgess Byrd), Ophelia’s lady-in-waiting, served as the young woman’s constant confidante. Guest director Kaja Dunn reinforced the script’s feminist perspective. Snatches of Shakespearean dialogue were used, but most conversations were in contemporary English. It was an intriguing extension of these women, reimagining them in ways that made sense in today’s world. (RP)

Mrs. Dalloway: A New Musical, May 23-June 15, 2025, Cincinnati Shakespeare Company

Lindsey Augusta Mercer wrote the book, lyrics and music for this adaptation of Virginia Woolf’s novel into a world premiere musical. I was not a fan of the novel, so I came to this production with a bit of trepidation but enjoyed it immensely. Christiana Cole, Byron St. Cyr, Bex Odorisio, Noah Berry, Courtney Lucien and Robby Clater brought their roles to life through strong performances and exceptional singing. The musical numbers drew on a wide range of styles, from folk to rock to rap. Mercer cleverly repeated themes and images which gave the disparate musical styles continuity and cohesiveness. I loved the pairing of the characters for unexpected duets and scene partners. The emphasis on the importance of human connection and celebrating life resonated in these post-pandemic, highly fragmented times. (JC)

Tea TIME, May 29-June 13, 2025, Cincinnati Fringe Festival

Full disclosure: I am a tea drinker who has spent 30 years frustrated at the normalization of terrible tea in the United States. As Dame Maggie Smith in The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel said, “Everywhere I’ve been in this country, they slap down a cup of tepid nonsense, you know, with the teabag lying beside it, which means I’ve got to go through the ridiculous business of dunking it in the lukewarm piss, waiting for the slightest change of color to occur.” So with joy and delight, I watched Erika MacDonald’s Cincinnati Fringe Festival show, Tea TIME, one of the fringiest of Fringe shows. Storytelling and performance art, singing and some serious topics — it was weird! But as colonists dumped tea in Boston Harbor 250 years ago, I dumped my expectation of a linear plot at the door and steeped myself in this charming, wandering contemplation on the world’s best caffeinated beverage. MacDonald was an engaging storyteller and performer, and her show was as brisk and refreshing as a proper cup of tea. (JC)

King James, Sept. 11- 27, Know Theatre

Two NBA fans, one Black, one white, come together (and nearly pull apart) around the early career of professional basketball star LeBron James. Rajiv Joseph’s play offered four scenes, termed “quarters,” from 2004 to 2016. But the sport was really the context and metaphor for the ups and downs of this unlikely friendship between the pair of Clevelanders, Matt (Kieran Cronin) and Shawn (Phillip Latham). Staged with insight and feeling in Know’s intimate Underground Bar — doubling as a struggling wine bar — by Darnell Pierre Benjamin, this two-hander offered a highly believable, deeply felt portrait of two young men learning more about what’s truly important in life. The production was a strong and promising kickoff for Know’s new management team, led by Artistic Director Bridget Leak. (RP)

Honorable Mention: Jaja’s African Hair Braiding, May 31-June 22, Ensemble Theatre Cincinnati

Thanks to Ensemble Theatre Cincinnati, I learned a lot about what goes on in hair salons catering to Black women. Jocelyn Bioh’s recent Broadway hit was a 90-minute lesson in the artistry, socializing and humanity of women in this unique universe. Director Torie Wiggins led a top-notch cast through an entertaining and thoughtful story. (RP)

Honorable Mention: Die Hard is a Christmas Movie, Nov. 28-Dec. 21, Know Theatre

This is my new favorite holiday show. In addition to hitting all the best lines/iconic scenes from Die Hard, the show perfectly balances parody and tribute. Maybe its popularity will convince the CSO to screen the film with live orchestration? Please? (JC)

This story is featured in CityBeat’s Dec. 24 print edition.

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Coming up next at the Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park is Lloyd Suh’s The Heart Sellers. Suh is one of the most produced playwrights in America today. In 2023, the Playhouse staged Suh’s The Chinese Lady, about Afong May, the first Chinese woman who entered America and was toured around as an attraction across the United States in the 19th century. The tour stopped for several days in Cincinnati in 1834. Like The Chinese Lady, The Heart Sellers, a heartfelt comedy, explores being a “stranger in a strange land.” It’s been one of the most produced plays in the U.S. since its debut in Milwaukee in early 2023. Ten theaters staged it a year ago, and eight more are offering it during the current season. 

The Heart Sellers is about a pair of 20-something Asian women in an unnamed midwestern U.S. city in 1973. Brought to America by their med student husbands, they are more or less set adrift. Jane from South Korea is reserved and has a limited command of English; Luna from the Philippines is a chatterbox, given to oversharing. They meet on Thanksgiving Day in a K-Mart and bond during a lonely celebration as they struggle to make a traditional American meal in Luna’s apartment. Fueled by wine, they talk about their isolation, their hopes and the families they yearn for. They fear their heritage will be diluted or forgotten altogether by future generations.

The play’s title is derived from U.S. legislation passed in 1965. Luna explains, “My sister says they call it the Hart-Celler Act because somebody whose name is Hart and somebody whose name is Celler, they wrote this thing and it got made into law and stuff just a few years ago, and I guess before it happened hardly nobody could come from Philippines or from Korea or no place where there’s people like, you know, like us?” Luna and Jane recognize that their journey to a foreign land could mean they’ve sold their hearts for new lives and drifted away from beloved traditions. 

The Hart-Celler Act, or the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, as it was formally known, was signed into law by former President Lyndon B. Johnson. The act reformed the nation’s immigration system, doing away with a discriminatory quota system that had favored people from Northern and Western Europe and limited immigration by many from other countries. Its legal framework prioritized highly skilled immigrants, such as Jane and Luna’s med student husbands. In 1960, 84 percent of immigrants to the U.S. were from Europe or Canada. Immigration grew by nearly a half million people annually post-1965, and the law eliminated “national origins” quotas and shifted the balance of immigrants to Latin America, Africa and Asia. 

May Adrales, who staged the play’s first production in Milwaukee, said in a program note there: “The Heart Sellers speaks specifically about a Korean woman and a Filipina woman, but it’s a universal story about what it means to migrate when that may or may not have been your choice and to be thrust into a set of cultural norms and a language that you don’t quite understand.” She added, “This play reveals what it means to be isolated and try to find a community when there’s seemingly nobody who can understand your experience. … Anyone who has transplanted from one culture to another or has faced a loss of identity and started anew will relate to the experiences of these characters. My great hope is that audiences come away with radical compassion, that they see the humanity within another person whom they didn’t think they had anything in common with.”

Desdemona Chiang is staging The Heart Sellers for the second time at the Playhouse. (She directed it over the summer for the Virginia Theatre Festival). Her first name, Desdemona (the tragic wife in Shakespeare’s Othello), surely set her up for a career in theater, including several years with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. But her horizons expanded well beyond that. Of Taiwanese descent, she immigrated with her family to America when she was 3 years old. In college at UC-Berkeley, she was pre-med, but a basic acting class drew her to theater and a double degree in that discipline and biology. These days, she dissects and stages plays across the U.S. that resonate with her heritage.

The show’s cast will be two actors new to Cincinnati audiences. Bridget Kim graduated from the University of Louisville and earned her master’s degree at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. Over the summer, she played Jane in Chiang’s Virginia production of The Heart Sellers. She’ll repeat that role at the Playhouse opposite Angeleia Ordoñez, a graduate of the University of Michigan, as Luna.

Suh is a little surprised at the geographical spread of The Heart Sellers, from the West Coast to Austin and Atlanta, as well as Chiang’s Virginia Theatre Festival staging. The playwright told an interviewer for American Theatre magazine, “The totality of it — to see it means this much to a much wider audience than I imagined — is so meaningful.” The Playhouse production is Cincinnati’s chance to join that audience.

The Heart Sellers, presented by the Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park on its Rosenthal Shelterhouse Stage in Mt. Adams, opens on Oct. 30 and continues through Nov. 23. For more information, visit cincyplay.com.

This story is featured in CityBeat’s Oct. 29 print edition.

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The city’s vibrant theater scene will crank up another notch as the Children’s Theatre of Cincinnati (TCT), America’s oldest professional theater for young audiences, is about to move into a historic space: Over-the-Rhine’s Emery Theater. It’s a homecoming of sorts, since TCT’s shows for children were produced there from 1949 to 1969. In 1970, it moved to the Taft Theatre on Fifth Street, where thousands of local schoolkids came annually on yellow school buses to see four kid-friendly performances.

Now, thanks to  a $51.5 million renovation of the historic Emery space, TCT will move into what it’s calling “the most technologically advanced proscenium-style theater in the United States.” With a Gilded Age pedigree, the Emery opened in 1912 as a new home for the 17-year-old Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. Leopold Stokowski, the CSO’s legendary music director from 1909 to 1912, compared the venue to New York’s Carnegie Hall. The CSO performed there until returning to Music Hall in 1936.

The adjacent classroom building (today’s Emery Center Apartments on Central Parkway), built for the Ohio Mechanics Institute, was absorbed into the University of Cincinnati in 1969. The theater ceased to be used regularly in the 1990s, after which it fell into disuse and disrepair. Starting in 1999, Cincinnati architectural firm GBBN worked with a few prospective buyers on plans for the theater’s possible renovation. Ownership eventually went to developers Dave Neyer and Chris Frutkin, who facilitated the sale of the entire building to TCT. 

The venerable theater company conducted a period of due diligence before acquiring the theater in 2023. Although some had deemed it beyond repair, TCT and GBBN, with considerable experience designing arts facilities venues across the U.S. (including the new homes locally for the Cincinnati Shakespeare Company and Cincinnati Ballet), determined that the building was actually in good structural shape, just sorely in need of cosmetic improvement and modern technology.

According to Kim Kern, TCT President and CEO, in a conversation with CityBeat, “We could have gone out to the suburbs and built something new, but that didn’t feel right. Cincinnati’s theater district is downtown, and TCT has always been downtown. We were the only ones that could make the Emery work. As the oldest professional theater for young audiences in the country, we already had a model that worked.” TCT began providing theater for children and parents in 1919. Today, its annual attendance for Taft Theatre productions has exceeded 110,000.

“We are a professional theater,” Kern explained. “Our audiences are children, not our actors. Our productions are Broadway quality.” She said TCT’s shows are typically one-hour “junior” versions — including The Wizard of Oz: Youth Edition, the debut production in October. (It was also TCT’s very first stage production in 1919, 20 years before the 1939 movie.) “Our productions are designed for the attention span of a child,” Kern added. “We are inspiring and engaging children in theater in an age-appropriate way that we believe instills a love of the arts that will pay forward to our sister organizations in town and create future audiences for our city.”

A CityBeat conversation with GBBN architects Marcene Kinney and Steve Karoly revealed some of the ingenuity required to convert a century-old concert stage and auditorium into a state-of-the-art theater facility. “The ‘front of house’ features were in rough shape,” said Karoly. “There were no dressing rooms. The stage was just 36 feet deep. There was no wing space on either side.  … The stage was half the size that TCT typically used [at the Taft Theatre]. We addressed this by putting in a stage lift.” 

That required excavating a deeper basement to accommodate an innovative “elevator” with a built-in turntable, capable of pushing scenery up to the stage level. According to Kinney, “Creativity was essential. Our architectural design had to accommodate projection-mapping technology. To fit everything together, we worked with theater planners for projection locations. That meant coordinating with construction contractors, since these locations were in the arch and walls.”

All this was accomplished while honoring the Emery’s historic design. But with GBBN’s expertise as well as Apeiro Design (a national expert that designed the Michael Jackson Experience and the Beatles LOVE Theatre in Las Vegas) and acoustical designers, TCT’s renovation touched and modified virtually every aspect of the facility. A narrow lobby is significantly expanded; a new elevator makes three levels of seating fully accessible. The hall was originally designed for 2,200 people with benches on the third level; now there are over 1,500 contemporary seats on all levels with unobstructed views of the stage.

A new canopy now shelters the entrance, topped by a yellow crown that symbolizes TCT. The theater has been updated with 21st-century technology, including the automated stage lift, mechanical systems for moving scenery, a rear stage wall that’s a digital LED screen and projection-mapping lighting for the proscenium and walls, creating an immersive experience for young theatergoers.

TCT’s future seems bright: “We are eager to be an anchor in OTR,” said Kern. “In the past [at the Taft], we had only eight weekends of performances. Once we have year-round programming, we can be an attraction to tourists and area residents.” TCT’s production schedule for 2025-2026 is similar to past seasons. Following Wizard of Oz: Youth Edition, TCT will present Elf The Musical JR. (Dec. 5-21), Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Musical (Feb. 20-March 8, 2026) and How to Train Your Dragon: The Musical JR. (April 17-May 3, 2026).

Kern plans to slowly ramp up. “There will be a third weekend for each production,” she said, “so there will be 12 weekends, up from eight.” More shows will be added, one season at a time. The first year, there will be one for very young audiences, then one aimed at middle schoolers. In 2028, Kern anticipates adding a summer production. TCT’s long-awaited return to the renovated Emery marks an exciting new chapter for Cincinnati’s oldest theater company.

The Wizard of Oz: Youth Edition, presented by the Children’s Theatre of Cincinnati at the historic Emery Theater, will be performed from Oct. 10-26. More info: thechildrenstheatre.com. 

This story is featured in CityBeat’s Sept. 17 print edition.

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Two of Cincinnati’s exceptional professional theaters kick off their 2025-2026 seasons with powerful shows on Aug. 30 and Sept. 5. At the Cincinnati Playhouse, it’s Where the Mountain Meets the Sea by Jeff Augustin; Cincinnati Shakespeare Company is staging an adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People.

On Aug. 30, veteran guest director Timothy Douglas returns to the Playhouse to stage Augustin’s play, a time-traveling duet about fathers, sons and the distances between them. His Playhouse productions — including last season’s Primary Trust, Clyde’s the season before and several of August Wilson’s “Century Cycle” plays — have repeatedly pleased audiences.

Augustin’s script tells two parallel stories: Jean, a Haitian immigrant father, is on a road trip from Miami to California in search of possibilities. Years later, after Jean’s death, his son, Jonah, an adult gay man, retraces his father’s journey, hoping to better understand a distant parent he never really knew. Their narratives are interwoven monologues. They never speak to one another directly, but as their stories unfold, common ground is revealed. Their bond across time deepens as their stories unfold, accompanied by folk-infused music created by The Bengsons. (The husband-wife duet is fondly remembered locally for their 2015 production of Hundred Days at Know Theatre in 2015.)

Augustin’s show debuted in 2020 at the Humana Festival in Louisville as a video concert during the pandemic; it had a fully realized off-Broadway production in 2022. A year ago, Douglas staged it at Signature Theatre in Arlington, Virginia. Joanie Schultz, the Playhouse’s associate artistic director, saw it there and urged Blake Robison, the theater’s artistic leader, to include it in the upcoming season. This is the first time it’s been staged without the Bengsons’ personal involvement, but with their enthusiastic blessing. 

In a phone conversation with CityBeat, Douglas said the two musicians he has cast have been folded into the storytelling. He said the show defies description: “It’s not a play; it’s not a musical.” Instead, he terms it “storytelling,” more like musical versions of “The Moth” or “StoryCorps” on public radio. He also suggested, “The evening is really a meditation, in no way a traditional play.”

The 80-minute production will be performed on the Playhouse’s intimate Shelterhouse stage. With Douglas, a subtle director who understands the script’s silences as much as its songs, it seems likely to be deeply affecting. “I’m so sure that Cincinnati audiences are going to so fully embrace it,” he said, “I’m really excited to share it with them.”

On Sept. 5, Cincy Shakes opens An Enemy of the People, Amy Herzog’s new adaptation of Ibsen’s 1882 bitter and tragic play about local politics, staged by artistic director Brian Isaac Phillips. The show premiered in a limited 16-week sold-out run on Broadway in 2024 that earned positive critical assessment and five Tony nominations. The production won the Tony Award for Best Revival of a Play. Actor Jeremy Strong, best known for his Emmy-winning role as Kendall Roy in HBO’s Succession, received the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for his performance as Dr. Stockmann.

A small-town doctor in Norway has been an upstanding citizen of the community. But when he’s hired to oversee a spa and research shockingly reveals that the water is dangerously contaminated, he risks everything to expose the secret. He is not heeded and, in fact, is condemned by those in power, especially his own brother. A pair of Cincy Shakes veterans play the pair — Brent Vimtrup is the upright Dr. Stockmann and Matthew Lewis Johnson is the town’s corrupt mayor Peter Stockmann.

In a conversation with CityBeat, Phillips said not many classic plays address issues of climate, so he was drawn to this one after seeing it in New York last year. He was impressed by Herzog’s swift adaptation of Ibsen’s long, talky script, previously adapted in 1950 by playwright Arthur Miller. “Herzog’s version gets to the crux of the matter a lot quicker with a lot more urgency than Miller,” Phillips said. In fact, the production takes just about two hours.

As a parent, the director thinks about the world coming to the next generation. “This play talks about the idea of when greed and commerce become a priority over health and safety.” A man who chooses to stand alone and say, “Wait a second, this is wrong, this isn’t the way it’s supposed to be,” is at risk. Phillips said, “For us as a people, it’s important to have this dialogue about something that is a prominent crisis.”

When rehearsals began, Phillips recalled, there was some joking comparing the play to the movie Jaws. “Dr. Stockmann is the Roy Scheider character saying, ‘You can’t go into the water,’ but the government, the mayor, the townspeople, they’ve got to make their money off the summer tourists.” Phillips compared the circumstances Ibsen imagined to “Dr. Fauci, looking out for public safety, public health during the pandemic, trying to make sure we’re being cautious. But it’s hurting business, and people would rather ignore a warning to make sure their livelihood is not threatened.” It’s a classic dilemma that Cincy Shakes will enable audiences to explore.

Phillips wants his production to inspire dialogue. “Using our recent history of going through COVID is a way to think about this. Where do you stand? With Dr. Stockmann or Mayor Stockmann? What are your plans? How would you address something like this? Would you have the courage to stand up if you were the one person standing alone?”

Where the Mountain Meets the Sea will be presented by the Cincinnati Playhouse from Aug. 30-Sept. 28. More info: cincyplay.com. An Enemy of the People will be onstage at Cincinnati Shakespeare Company’s Otto M. Budig Theater from Sept. 5-20. More info: cincyshakes.com. 

This story is featured in CityBeat’s Sept. 3 print edition.

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For the past several summers, I have traveled to an array of summertime theaters and reported back to CityBeat readers about what I’ve seen, encouraging them to travel elsewhere for some worthy entertainment. I’ve visited the Stratford and Shaw festivals in Canada and the Contemporary American Theatre Festival in West Virginia. This summer, I headed to Spring Green, Wisconsin, to take in five of the shows produced by American Players Theatre (APT) for its 2025 season, which opened in April and continues through early November. APT is nearly 500 miles from Cincinnati, making for a drive of close to eight hours. That’s a long trek, but it’s completely worth it.

APT has been around since 1980, when it was created on 110 acres of wooded farmland in rural Wisconsin with the intention of staging plays by Shakespeare in an open-air amphitheater. The first performance there was A Midsummer Night’s Dream. By the mid-1980s, it added other classic playwrights to its repertoire, and more recently, it has occasionally staged a world premiere. Each season offers nine productions in rotating repertory using the Hill Theatre, which seats 1,088, and the newer indoor Touchstone Theatre, a freestanding black-box with seating for 200. Both venues are reached by gravel paths that wind through the woods, and both are surrounded by a lush forest. The Hill Theatre is extremely flexible, often incorporating some of the surrounding vegetation when a play’s story needs a natural setting. 

A typical APT season plays to more than 110,000 people, who come from across the upper Midwest. An acting company of 40 professionals work throughout the season; many of them play multiple roles. The performers do not use body microphones; they are coached to project their voices, which are modestly amplified by area mics. Their voices often mingle with bird songs and nighttime insect sounds.

Here are some notes on the shows I saw:

ANNA IN THE TROPICS by Nilo Cruz. This 2003 Pulitzer Prize winner is the story of a family-owned cigar factory in 1929 Florida. In a tradition beginning in Cuba, a “lector” is hired to read novels to the women employees who roll cigars. In this story, he shares Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina with a Cuban-American woman and her daughters who are soon swooning over — and identifying with —this passionate, romantic tragedy. As the play unfolds, the events of the novel become uncannily parallel to the lives of the characters, for better and for worse. It’s a beautiful, poetic piece of theater, full of music and steamy interactions. Lector Juan Julian (Ronald Román-Meléndez) charms each woman, much to the dismay of a husband of one daughter and an uncle who wants to be rid of the distraction and automate the daily work. The clash is tempestuous, but there’s always time for some sinuous cigar smoke to waft through the night air at the Hill Theatre.

A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM by William Shakespeare was APT’s very first Shakespeare production back in 1980, and it’s been produced several times to satisfied audiences. It works perfectly at the Hill amphitheater, since most of the story of romantic mismatches and confusion happens in an enchanted Athenian forest. Director David Daniel made an interesting casting decision: Puck, the sprite who carries out the bidding of the fairy king Oberon (Jim DeVita) is played by a pair of rambunctious, high-energy actors who race up and down the theater’s aisles. Joshua M. Castille performs using American Sign Language. He and Casey Hoekstra sometimes speak together, sometimes separately, as playful halves of the mischievous role. The “rude mechanicals” who amateurishly stage a skit are the comic heart of the production, especially Sam Luis Massaro as the preening goofball Bottom who ends up with an ass’s head. (He was the ill-tempered uncle in Anna in the Tropics.)

THE BARBER AND THE UNNAMED PRINCE by Gavin Dillon Lawrence. A world premiere commissioned by APT is being staged indoors in the intimate Touchstone Theatre. It’s the story of a gentrifying neighborhood in Washington, D.C. in 2012. The story swirls around Kofi (David Alan Anderson), a stubborn, proud Black barber who refuses to give up his shop even as the African American businesses around him are disappearing, replaced by upscale residents and businesses, mostly white. His son Prince (Jonathan Gardner), a good student, is eager to move on, but he’s also being drawn into bad behavior. Others frequenting the shop offer opinions and recollections, especially Smitty (Cedric G. Young), who has visions about ancestors captured in Africa and brought to slavery in North America. The death of an actual local D.C. musician, funk/go-go band leader Chuck Brown, is a sign of changing times; his music pervades the show. Lawrence’s script features wry humor, but a pervading air of sadness and a tragic ending make this a memorable production — one certainly inspired by playwright August Wilson.

THE WINTER’S TALE by William Shakespeare. This infrequently produced play was written toward the end of Shakespeare’s life. It opens with a tragic tale about the foolishly jealous King Leontes (Nate Burger), who wrongly accuses his pregnant Queen Hermione (Laura Rook) of an affair. His obsession leads to a disastrous trial and then her death following her daughter’s birth. Following intermission, the story jumps forward 16 years when the repentant, guilt-ridden Leontes surprisingly reunites with his teenaged daughter Perdita (Molly Martinez-Collins), thought abandoned but raised by some very comic shepherds (David Daniel and Josh Krause). It ends happily with an unlikely magical twist. This was another Hill Theatre production that took special advantage of the forest growth around and behind the stage.

FALLEN ANGELS by Noël Coward. The hilarious high point of the APT shows I attended was this classic farce by the erudite British playwright. It was onstage during a sunny Saturday matinee, so the Hill Theatre’s stage and part of the audience were shaded by a gauzy canopy over a swanky 1920s art deco London flat. It’s the story of two married women, bored with their mundane husbands, who learn that a suave Frenchman they each had premarital affairs with has come to London, seeking to reconnect. Phoebe Gonzalez (the naïve, romantic younger daughter in Anna in the Tropics) is petite, tart Julia Sterroll; Laura Rook (the wronged Hermione in The Winter’s Tale) is willowy, anxious Jane Banbury. Their antic performances of Coward’s witty, high-speed dialogue fuel this hurtling comedy, and it also features some very elaborate and well-executed physical slapstick. Colleen Madden played Saunders, a saucy Scots maidservant full of profound wisdom about any topic that arises, based on her seemingly endless (and unbelievable) series of life experiences. Amusingly, the sexy Maurice Duclos is played by Ronald Román-Meléndez, the lector from Anna in the Tropics. Two other familiar faces in this cast: Nate Burger (King Leontes in The Winter’s Tale) is Julia’s husband Fred, and Sam Luis Massaro (previously seen as the angry uncle in Anna in the Tropics and foolish Nick Bottom in Midsummer Night’s Dream) is Jane’s dense spouse. All in all, a bravura demonstration of the versatility of APT’s acting company.

More than two months of performances remain for anyone willing to head to Wisconsin. The shows I didn’t see: William Inge’s 1953 drama Picnic; Yasmina Reza’s three-actor comedy Art; and Nina Raines’s Tribes, about a young man who’s the only deaf member of a dysfunctional family. (It was staged here in Cincinnati back in 2014 by Ensemble Theatre.) 

Tickets and information: americanplayers.org. 

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