The Pine City Heritage Players are no strangers to trying new things — new scripts, new costumes, new set pieces.
But this month, the community theater is experiencing two firsts at the same time: a dinner theater and a director known more for acting with the Heritage Players than leading the charge.
The theater will debut its dinner theater at 6 pm on March 8 and 9 at the Braham Event Center, with an interactive mystery appropriately called “Murder on the Menu.” A dessert show will be served up at 2 pm on March 10.
Dawn Carpenter, president of the theater’s board of directors, said doing a dinner theater had been cooking for some time.
“This is our first adventure out of this community and our first collaboration with the Braham Event Center, which we’re really excited about,” Carpenter said. “We’ve been wanting to do a dinner theater for a while, and there really hasn’t been a venue in this area that could support it. So we thought, well, let’s move out and try it in another community and bring Pine City Heritage Players to another community to try to spread that theater experience, so we’re really excited to try this inaugural event.”
In choosing the script, the board knew it didn’t want to do a huge musical, which “always works better for summer,” Carpenter said. “We decided to do something a little bit more manageable, without such a huge cast, and then we thought, ‘Let’s try a murder mystery.’”
Board members have several play options to read through and land on “Murder on the Menu,” which is seemingly tailor-made for dinner theater.
More choices
In choosing a director, they didn’t hesitate when Emily Schueller expressed an interest. Emily has directed students at Rush City High School, but this is her first time leading a group of adults. Emily’s parents, Becky and Jay, have long been active with the theater as actors, directors and technicians.
Despite knowing she could offer advice if needed, Becky said she was “doing my best to stay away from rehearsals.” She doesn’t doubt Emily’s ability to lead this group of actors.
“My husband has very much got the designer brain along with the director brain,” Becky said. “I have a director brain, but I’m more of an organizer. I do graphic design, and websites, and marketing, and all of those things. Emily has been raised by the two of us, so it’s like seeing her father and I merged into one person. It’s really kind of exciting to watch her.”
As for Emily, she acknowledges that directing adults is quite different than working with high school students.
“But I’ve really enjoyed being able to bring a vision to my actors and then see it unfold,” she said. “I’ve never been on this side of it — like all of my little ones brain thoughts are just pouring out and coming to life in front of me.”
Braham Event Center is providing a small elevated stage for the play, but Heritage Players will be bringing in several scenic walls and set pieces.
“The script also calls for a lot of interactive, so I have my actors going into the audience and interacting with them as well,” Emily said.
Because it will compel actors to rely on their improvisational skills, which happen on the spur of the moment and can’t be rehearsed, per se, one of the strategies in rehearsal is to “come up with the wildest things to try to throw off each other and that prepares them for whatever they might encounter, even the most mundane thing.”
Emily says she has been involved in theater virtually her whole life. Her first experience with the Heritage Players was in 2015 when she was part of the cast of “The Music Man.”
“I’ve been around the stage since I was very, very young.”
Carpenter acknowledged Emily’s long-time experience in the theater and said, “Choosing Emily to direct was a no-brainer. She’s been raised in it. She’s wonderful and doing a fantastic job.”
A graduate of Pine City High School in 2020, meaning she’s only 21 years old. She has completed her general studies at Pine Tech, but at this point, has made no decision on whether she wants to continue with any schooling.
I have all these ideas in my head of what I want to do, and I’ve been testing the waters and finding something I’m truly passionate about.
Could that be theater?
“Theater is more of a hobby, and I have this mentality that if I made my hobby into my career I might not love it as much. I’d much rather have my career and come home and still do my hobby.”
For many, Carpenter said, taking part in theater is more than just a hobby. People carve out time to participate because “it’s definitely a passion,” she said. “We all just love theater, and we have a great group of people and that sense of community to build a place where people who want to get up on stage and do stuff, they can come and do that.
“There’s a welcoming place and it’s like a family. And there are people who don’t want to get on stage and just want to work behind the scenes, there’s a place for them, too. It’s a passion and a hobby. I think all of us have times where we’ve drifted away from it, but we keep getting pulled back in. It’s in your blood.”
She stressed that the Heritage Players included people from around the area. “You don’t have to be from Pine City to take part. We welcome anyone with that love for theater, on the stage, behind the stage. Love for theater and for community, because we think of it as a community, too.”
“We’ve had great community support, and Pine City is a great supporter of the arts, whether it’s our theater, the high school theater, high school band and chorus, the arts center, the community has been extremely supportive.”
She recommends that people come to the show because “it’s going to be fun, engaging, an opportunity to enjoy a little mystery, some great theater, and a good dinner in a beautiful Event Center. It’s our inaugural event with them and it’s going to be a great experience. The actors are working hard and are ready to stump you on ‘whodunnit.’”
Added Emily Schueller, “The biggest thing I want my audience to come and experience is a good time. Comedy is one of the things that Heritage Players is able to produce and we are doing our best, and I still laugh in rehearsals even at jokes I’ve heard a million times.
“I just want people to come and have a good time, whether it be with the complete strangers they are sitting with at their table or the people they’ve come with. I want them to have not only really good food but the time of their lives.”