"The Brontide" by nimbus theater at The Crane Theater

This weekend, I spent two nights in a row at The Crane Theater, seeing two completely different shows. Friday night I saw a spooky pair of short plays, Ghoulish Delights' Bonehouse / Outsider, in the small studio space, and on Saturday I went back to see a new work by nimbus theatre, who owns/operates the space, in the main theater. nimbus almost exclusively does new work, often developed by the ensemble. Their newest work, The Brontide, was born out of an idea by co-Artistic Director Mitchell Frazier and company member Ernest Briggs (who also co-direct). An idea about stories, who tells them, who needs to hear them, who owns them. The result, by playwright Josh Cragun (another co-Artistic Director) is a modern and fantastical story about a tech company mogul who tries to buy up all of the stories in the world, and the scientist and filmmaker who try to stop him. As if often the case with new work, it could use a bit of editing and tightening up, but there are some interesting and relevant ideas discussed, and some great performances. The Brontide continues through June 9, Bonehouse / Outsider closes on May 25, and Skylark Opera Theatre's production of the Sondheim revue Marry Me A Little opens at the Crane on June 20.

"A Very Electric Christmas" by nimbus theatre at The Crane Theater

nimbus theatre's first holiday* show last year, A Count Up to Christmas - a spoof of the Hallmark holiday movie, was such a success that they're doing another one this year. Last year, the show featured commercials for other "movies" in the network's line-up, and they took one of those and turned it into this year's show. While I didn't enjoy it as much as last year's show, it's still full of fun cliches, bad puns, and double entendres, with a festive design and entertaining performances. See A Very Electric Christmas at The Crane Theater in Northeast Minneapolis through December 17.

"The Red and the Bright" by nimbus theatre at the Crane Theater

photo by Todd Craig

nimbus theatre is celebrating 20 years in #TCTheater with their 50th production, the original play The Red and the Bright. From my first nimbus show, the original and locally historical play Bohemian Flats in 2013, to the harsh look at race and racism in America in Nacirema, to the breathtaking design of Ghost Sonata, to a fascinating look into art forgery in From Darkness, to many historical dramas and even a comedy, what I've come to expect from nimbus is something interesting, thoughtful, and unique. Sometimes a little weird, sometimes a little rough, but always intriguing, forward-thinking, and worth checking out. They often do original plays, as is the case with The Red and the Bright, written by co-Artistic Director Liz Neerland and directed by co-Artistic Director Josh Cragun. They began working on it before the pandemic, and it's finally seeing the stage, presenting a fantasy world that feels real and complete unto itself, from the language spoken, to the relationships amongst the tight community, to the detailed design. Only two more performances remain; click here for info and tickets.

"Redemption" by nimbus theater at the Crane Theater

nimbus theatre's latest original work, Redemption, deals with the tricky issue of reentry into civilian life after time spent in prison. Playwright Josh Cragun and director Mitchell Frazier researched the topic extensively and talked with people affected by the issue. The result is a thoughtful look at the lives of two recently released prisoners and how their release affects their family and their victims (sometime one in the same). We're facing so many problems in this country right now that our flawed prison system (nimbus quotes a few statistics in their program, including "the US holds only 4.4% of the world's population, but we have 22% of the world's prisoners" and "we incarcerate at a higher rate than any other country in the world") seems to have taken a back burner. Not at nimbus, where Redemption doesn't offer any answers, but rather calls for compassion and understanding on all sides.

"From Darkness" at nimbus theatre

Everything I know about art I learned from playing the game Masterpiece as a kid (Private Auction! anyone?) and from the Baroque Art History class I took at the University of Salzburg (a pretty amazing experience because we took field trips to Vienna and Rome to see the art we were studying). So I don't know much, but I am fascinated by art and art history. But I've never thought much about art forgery, which adds a whole new level of fascination. This topic is the inspiration for nimbus theatre's new play From Darkness, written (along with the ensemble) and directed by co-Artistic Director Josh Cragun. Specifically, how does someone with the skill of an art master decide to practice art forgery instead of creating original work? From Darkness sets fictional art forger Stanley Mansfield among real artists in NYC's post-WWII abstract art scene and attempts to answer this question, as well as explore ideas of what makes art valuable. It's a fascinating, thought-provoking play, and as is often the case when I see a play at nimbus, it made me want to find out more about the topic.

Caravaggio's The Denial of St. Peter

We follow two groups of characters in two different time periods in NYC - a group of artists and art collectors in the '30s, '40s, and '50s, and art curators at the Met in the current day. Both stories center around the above piece of art - The Denial of St. Peter by Caravaggio (one of my favorite artists from the Baroque Art History class). A new curator at the Met discovers something off about the painting, leading her to research its history. At the same time, we're watching Stanley Mansfield's life and career as an artist unfold. He's a figurative painter at a time when abstract painting is all the rage. He watches his friends (including Jackson Pollack and Lee Krasner) succeed while he struggles to find his place. Through a series of circumstances, his career begins to take a different path. At the end of the play the two stories come together, and we're left wondering just who the bad guy is, if there is one.

Nicholas Nelson as the forger Stanley Mansfield

Everyone in the eight-person ensemble plays multiple characters, except for Nicholas Nelson who plays forger Stanley Mansfield, and makes his transition believable and sympathetic. Highlights in the ensemble include Art Peden as the older Stanley, Zach Morgan as his stern father and the tempestuous Pollack, and Heidi Berg as the strict art curator and gallery owner Betty Parsons. The clever set is constructed of rotating panels, opening up to form different locations, revealing reproductions (by Ursula K. Bowden) of different paintings, from Caravaggio to Pollack. The rotating panels make for some awkward scene transitions, which are nicely covered by period music and images of paintings, buildings, or old New York displayed on either side of the stage. And I recognized a few of my favorite Masterpiece paintings in the images projected before the show and during intermission. (Set design by Brian Hesser, video design by Caitlin Hammel.)

As a new play, From Darkness feels a bit long and could be tightened up a bit, but the multiple characters and timelines are nicely woven together and the ideas explored compelling, relevant, and definitely worth exploring. Who decides what art is worthwhile, and which artists are worthy of acclaim? If a viewer gets as much enjoyment from a reproduction of a painting as the original, isn't that worth something too? Fashion designers don't physically construct the garments they design (except on Project Runway); someone else makes them according to the designer's specifications. That's not so very different from Mansfield constructing a painting following Caravaggio's design. In the current age of the internet, reproductions and replications of all forms of art abound. As long as the original creator is given credit, and we all know what's going on, isn't that a good thing, to spread art to as many people as possible? I don't know, but these are some of the things this play made me think about.

As Caravaggio excelled in the technique of extreme light and dark known as chiaroscuro, "from darkness, light," nimbus theatre excels at creating original work around an interesting topic, bringing to life on their stage relevant ideas and questions about various facets of life and history. From Darkness continues through June 14 (discount tickets available on Goldstar).