The Franklin Stage Company is celebrating its 30th anniversary season with a lineup of theater, dance, and new works that Executive Artistic Director Patricia Buckley describes as both entertaining and deeply relevant.
The season opens with a May fundraiser marking three decades of admission-free theater in rural Delaware County. Buckley said the evening will feature food, drinks, a commemorative video, and a special performance by Duo Extemporary, featuring bassist Evan Jagels and pianist Nicole Brancato.
“We’re so proud and excited about” reaching the 30-year milestone, Buckley said. “I think it’s going to be a wonderful evening to celebrate how our little admission-free theater has been around for 30 years.”
Franklin Stage Company has long operated on a pay-what-you-can model, supported through grants, fundraising campaigns, and audience donations. Buckley said the approach reflects the company’s commitment to community.
“The experience of sitting in a dark room together watching a story creates community,” she said. “We like to think that our model of doing that admission free is another layer toward creating community, because the audience is actually taking care of each other.”
The summer season begins with Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, adapted and streamlined by Buckley for a cast of nine actors. While the comedy is known for its wit and romance, Buckley said its themes feel especially timely.
“It’s also about misinformation, gossip, mistaken identity, and kind of the tears that can happen to society, and the ways to repair those tears,” she said. “I think it’s a very relevant play for right now.”
Later in the season, the company will present Home?, a solo work by Palestinian actor and writer Penn Day exploring her experience growing up as an Arab living in Israel. Buckley described the piece as “very funny” and “very beautiful.”
A weekend of dance and film follows with performances by the two-woman company Dual Rivet, whose physically demanding and cinematic work impressed Buckley at a recent arts conference in New York.
“Their process and their work is so athletic and just beautiful,” she said. “I thought I just have to get them upstate if I can.”
The season concludes with the world premiere of The Civilities by playwright Kyle Bass. Set in upstate New York in 1936, the drama follows a young African American Cornell graduate student researching former Confederates living in the North.
Buckley called the play “intriguing,” praising both its language and suspenseful storytelling.
“At the end of act one, you will be like, ‘Oh my god, what’s gonna happen?’” she said. “People came back to the second reading because they had to find out what happens.”
Franklin Stage Company begins its anniversary season with a fundraising celebration May 31 at Chapel Hall in Franklin, New York. The summer productions continue through the season at Chapel Hall. More information is available at Franklin Stage Company.