This summer, Sod House — a theater company founded by Augsburg College Chair of Theater Arts Darcey Engen ’88 and her husband, Luverne Seifert ’83 — brought a production of “Hoopla Train (with Yard Master Yip and his Polkastra)” to 14 historic ballrooms in different Minnesota cities including Barrett, McGregor, Nisswa, and Sleepy Eye.
Engen and Seifert shared the stage with a troupe of performers to put on the production billed as “Lawrence Welk meets ‘Hee-Haw.’” The Sod House Theater project began in 2011 when Engen and Seifert collaborated to create the condensed version of Anton Chekhov’s play “The Cherry Orchard” with Twin Cities colleagues including Sarah Myers, associate professor of theater at Augsburg.
This year the “Hoopla Train” has garnered the attention of media outlets across Minnesota, including the following organizations and stories:
- BringMeTheNews — Hoopla Train: The touring theater variety show coming to a stage near you
- Star Tribune — Summer is showtime for Sod House, Minnesota’s whistle-stop theater
- Faribault Daily News — All aboard the ‘Hoopla Train’ bound for Faribault
- Rochester Post-Bulletin — ‘Hoopla Train’ pulls into town
- Pine and Lakes Echo Journal — Professional Twin Cities Theater Troupe to perform at the American Legion in Nisswa
- Sleepy Eye Herald-Dispatch — ‘Hoopla Train’ show coming to Sleepy Eye next week
- St. Cloud Times — ‘Hoopla’ brings old-fashioned fun to outstate Minnesota
Darcey Engen, associate professor and chair of the Theater Department, said the rehearsal process raised important questions for the cast members. “1930s Germany was a time of great wealth and great poverty, and the middle class was stressed,” Engen said. “We discussed the conditions, drawing similarities to what is now happening in our country.”
This summer, alumni Darcey Engen ’88 [left] and her husband, Luverne Siefert ’83, will bring a site-specific production of Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard to the Minnesota communities of Blue Earth, Kenyon, Little Falls, Taylors Falls, and Worthington.
The first mainstage production of the Augsburg theater season begins this week with The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade, a play by Peter Weiss. Through their roles in the play and their participation in a growing U.S. protest movement, the Augsburg cast members have experienced the power and complexity of a peoples’ revolution.
Later this month, two Augsburg alumni and an all-star cast will debut a unique site-specific production of Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard at the Historic Lind House in New Ulm, Minn. The production also features high school and community actors from the Sleepy Eye/New Ulm area and includes live music from the Sleepy Eye Concertina Club.
What would compel a college theatre director to present a play about a woman whose husband essentially abuses her?
The Augsburg College Theatre Arts Department will present it’s final MainStage production of the 2007-08 season, “Top Girls,” at 7 p.m. on April 11, 12, 17, 18, and 19, and 2 p.m. on April 13 and 20 in Tjornhom-Nelson Theater. Darcey Engen ’88 is directing the production.