Meet Marianne and Roland. She’s a bit quirky; he’s in a relationship.

Meet Marianne and Roland. She’s determined; he’s just come out of a relationship.

Meet Marianne and Roland. She’s a theoretical cosmologist; he’s a beekeeper.

They’re the characters in the one-act play Constellations by Nick Payne, which I’m directing for Wisconsin Rapids Community Theatre. It’s sort of a love story, and it follows their relationship from the beginning to the end. But it’s not linear, and we explore many scenarios as they get together, grow apart, hang on and let go.

Constellations is not like anything you’ve seen, and I don’t want to give anything away about it. I want you — the audience — to be surprised, like I was when I first read it. It blew my mind, and I had to go back and read it again. Then I gave it to my daughter, another theater geek, and she loved it. She shared it with a friend, and soon we were like groupies, but instead of dreaming of seeing our favorite band perform, we wanted to put on this play.

That was in 2017. I’ve been sitting on it since then, waiting for the time to be right. I went away, to Tennessee and Portugal. When I was back in Wisconsin on an extended visit, COVID hit, and that ended my travels for a while. But it also opened up the possibility of doing more with theater.

I was invited to help direct several Robert Frost poems, staged as mini one-act plays, which we filmed and posted to YouTube. The experience got me back into theater and more specifically into directing. It helped give me the confidence to attempt a show on my own. That’s when my daughter started talking about Constellations again, suggesting I could do it, I should do it.

Here we are, then, in the midst of rehearsals, working out the details, watching it come together.

For me, theater has always been about the process. I love everything about it from start to finish. Even the parts other actors don’t care for, like blocking, I enjoy it all. As a director, I get to extend the process into months of planning before we even begin rehearsals. It’s exciting and a little scary to have the responsibility of everything, but I’m a planner, so I like it.

As director, I also get to see this show come together, from pictures in my head to reality on the stage. That’s very cool.

Now, I’m excited to share it with you. I’d love for you to see this passion project, five years in the making. Tickets are limited; we’re only doing two performances, April 8 and 9, 2022, in the smaller studio theater. Because of licensing restrictions, we’re not able to record it. Live theater is best, anyway.

I hope you’ll come meet Marianne and Roland. This show will blow your mind, and I can’t wait for you to see it.

You can order tickets ($10 each, general seating) by calling 715-421-0435 or online at https://wrctheatre.vbotickets.com/events.