"Penelope" by Theatre Elision at Elision Playhouse

It's such a joy to revisit a good show after a period time. As an audience member, but also, I imagine, as an artist too. Theatre Elision staged the new one-woman (and five-musician) musical Penelope last summer, just a year after it premiered in New York. They're remounting it this summer for just two weekends at their home Elision Playhouse in Crystal. If you missed it last summer, you really must see it this year; like most of Theatre Elision's work, it's a musical you can't see anywhere else. And if you did see it last year, you might find deeper meaning and understanding this year, as I did. Penelope really is a gem of a musical, and Christine Wade is even more at home in the role than she was last year (a performance that earned her a Twin Cities Theater Blogger Award nomination). The show is just 70 minutes long, preceded by a bit of Greek trivia, in an intimate welcoming space with concessions. It has more of a concert vibe than a traditional musical, so it's great for music lovers as well as musical theater fans. Just five shows remain - make your Penelope plans now!

What follows is my (slightly edited) review from last year. Penelope, about the long-waiting wife of Odysseus, premiered in 2023 in New York. What started as a pandemic project by singer-songwriter Alex Bechtel turned into a concept album, and then a one-woman musical with help from director Eva Steinmetz and book writer Grace McLean (who also wrote Elision's earlier show In the Green). 

Christine Wade as Penelope
(photo by Jolie Morehouse Olson)

Everyone knows about Odysseus, the hero of the ancient epic poem The Odyssey. His wife is little more than a footnote in the story, waiting for him at home, raising their son, until his return after 20 years away fighting in the Trojan War and struggling through many obstacles on the return trip. In this show, Penelope gets to tell her side of the story. She tells it in song and direct audience address, speaking and singing into a hand-held mic, as if she's doing a pop concert (almost like SIX, but more mellow and moody). There are about a dozen songs of varying styles in the singer-songwriter vein, some melancholy, some playful, some angry. In between songs Penelope talks to us about her husband, her son, the many annoying suitors hanging around her house, speaking in a modern and relatable style, and giving us an intimate look into her feelings about her husband, her life, and her current situation. 

This is Christine Wade's first solo show, but you'd never know it; she commands the stage with confidence, and has the audience in the palm of her hand. She sings beautifully, and also conveys the full range of emotion that Penelope goes through in her stationary journey. And if that's not enough, she also plays the piano on many of the songs. But of course, a one-person show is never really just one person; she's joined onstage by a five-piece orchestra (led by resident Music Director Harrison Wade on keyboard), including three strings, creating a lusher and fuller sound than I was expecting in a one-person musical. Cellist Rae Wasson also has a small but pivotal speaking and singing role.

Christine Wade (Penelope) at the piano
(photo courtesy by Jolie Morehouse Olson)

The show is also beautifully staged, by director Rachel Brady. The set is dominated by a grand piano with the orchestra on one side, the floor strewn with cozy area rugs, with warm lighting that changes with the tone of the show. Christine enters alone and sits at the piano, joined by the musicians one by one. She's not always at the piano, walking across the stage to the bar (where you can get drinks before the show), singing at a mic stand, sitting companionably at one of the cabaret tables in front (which you can reserve). Then the reverse happens at the end of the piece, the musicians leave one by one, until we're left with Penelope sitting along at the piano again, almost melancholy. As if her husband's return was just a dream and she's gone back to waiting, or she's mourning the time that was lost, or maybe that "long-delayed but always expected something that we live for" didn't quite live up her idea of it, as is often the case. Maybe the living is in the waiting, and not in the found.

Penelope continues at Elision Playhouse in Crystal through July 28. No knowledge of The Odyssey is required, but if you do possess some, you might win a prize at the fun pre-show Greek trivia contest hosted by Harrison Wade. Some questions are pretty deep cuts, but just by reading to this point you know at least two of the answers.