Omaha Community Playhouse in 80 Days - Mark Brown

Omaha Community Playhouse Goes Around the World

The Omaha Community Playhouse, the country’s largest community theatre (more on that in a bit), is producing my play Around the World in 80 Days. It runs January 20 -February 12.

I hate to point these things out but my OCD gets the better of me. Here’s the poster for the show. Can you spot the mistake?

The Largest Community Theatre

So it turns out that the Omaha Community Playhouse is the country’s largest community theatre. It is 94 years old, has 35 full-time employees, more than 1,000 volunteers and 5,000 season ticket holders!! Holy hell-o kitty!? Amazing. I know a lot of LORT theatres that don’t have those kind of stats.

Around the World in 80 Days

The show stars:

Anthony Clark-Kaczmarek as Phileas Fogg; Ablan Roblin as Jean Passepartout; Teri Fender as Aouda; And I’m guessing two more actors. I can’t find any information on them. They’re sort of like the professor and Maryann from Gilligan’s Island. And the rest.

The director is Carl Beck, a pillar of Nebraska Theatre. Now I have a connection, sort of, to Carl and the Playhouse. Years ago, back when I was starting out as an actor, I sent my headshot and photo to Carl several times for a job at the Nebraska Theatre Caravan, the professional touring wing of the Playhouse. I never got a job there. I never got a phone call. I didn’t even get a rock. The theatre was much better off without me. Believe me. But I’m glad that I’m finally showing up at the Playhouse. I knew I’d get there one day.

I love this photo. It’s a shot of the costume plot. It looks a lot like one of the many charts I made when I was writing the script.

Thank You

A big thank you to Carl, Kimberly Faith Hickman (Artistic Director) and everyone at the Omaha Community Playhouse for producing one of my shows. I really appreciate it.

I don’t always drink tea. But when I do, I make it English Breakfast.