Theater for the masses - a bridge over the avant-garde elite

Marnie McArthur, reno.com, tahoe.com
March 1, 2008

Neon lights in the windows suggest a glitzy night spot. But, step behind the doors of Brüka Theatre on Virginia Street at First and you’ll discover one of the most unusual small performance spaces found in any city – off-Broadway, off-anywhere.

A whiff of incense in the lobby and couch seating in the theater creates instant counter culture comfort. If you’re seated on a couch with people you don’t know, you’re bound to make conversation and perhaps new friends. Brüka isn’t big city and doesn’t try to be. But, its diverse artistic choices and professional quality productions create good, solid entertainment for locals and visitors in the biggest little city.

“It’s different than going to a traditional theater. We’ve seen plays that are new to us and the actors are all very good,” says patron subscriber Erika Winkler, who has been coming to Brüka for three years with her husband Peter.

Beginnings
Brüka is a partnership and collaboration between founder Scott Beers, who serves as artistic director, Producing Director Mary Bennett, and an ensemble of up to 10 actors, many of whom have worked with the theater since the beginning. Plays are chosen by Beers and Bennett with consideration and suggestions from the ensemble.

Beers founded Brüka in 1992 as a theater performing plays for children. In 1999, he merged his company with Bennett’s theater, Renaissance Projects, which had a history of performances in Carson City, Virginia City, and the San Francisco Fringe Festival.

Asked about his artistic vision, Beers cuts to the core of Brüka and the basis for the company’s name. “Art for the masses; everyone has a right to experience art and the work of actors who want to come together to create,” says Beers.

The name Brüka
According to program notes, “The name Brüka Theatre is based on a German group of artists known as Die Brücke (The Bridge -- “linking all the revolutionary and surging elements”). Die Brücke may have derived from Nietzche’s philosophy of the “rope over an abyss” or the need of humanity to achieve a higher condition. The Die Brücke artists rejected art they perceived as elitist avant-garde.”

“Our goal is to give Reno a solid theater and to keep the season active and challenging for the actors and audience,” says Bennett. ‘We try to do newer things, to present works that aren’t done a lot by community theaters – original pieces, contemporary works and some classics. The company is good at farce so we do a lot of that.”

Over 15 years Brüka has produced works by playwrights as diverse as Pinter, Sheppard and Shakespeare, everything from serious contemporary dramas and dark comedies to wild rock opera, farce, and original Brüka creations such as Buttcracker and the sequel Buttcracker 2, hilarious spoofs of the Nutcracker, destined to become Reno’s alternative holiday classics. The dedicated ensemble is what makes shows like this and others at Brüka work.

“It takes Renaissance kind of people, talented and practical, who are willing to pitch in to do it all because they love theater and are interested in producing art beyond a hobby,” says Bennett.

Most of the actors have worked professionally in other cities and are here in Reno because it’s a great place to live and work. While the lean core staff receives small salaries, the actors receive only occasional modest stipends. Everyone does other jobs to make ends meet.

Bennett, whose professional training includes workshops at ACT in San Francisco and an internship at Sacramento’s B Street Theatre, teaches improv at local high schools. Beers began working as a child actor with Michael Harrah’s Junior Light Opera West and has performed professionally in Los Angeles on and off since the age of eight. He also worked for years at Burning Man up until 2008 when he went to work for Marathon Racing.

History
Brüka originally performed in a proscenium-style theater upstairs in the Masonic building at First and North Virginia Streets. When the Truckee River flooded the basement in 1997, the company offered to clean up the mess if they could move downstairs. The Masons, who have been continually supportive of the theater, agreed.

The theater now occupies two levels at 99 North Virginia Street in the center of Reno’s Art District. The main theater, which seats 70, is on the street level. Under the main stage, Sub Brüka is an intimate 50-seat black-box style space where the company stages play readings, performance pieces, music, and open mic-style evenings called Bohemia where actors try out original works before a live audience.

Theatre for Children
Brüka’s Theatre for Children mounts a new touring production every other year and tours for two years to schools throughout Northern Nevada and some in California. Bookings are through the Pioneer Center Youth Programs or are independently arranged.

Most of the children’s shows are a two-person cast (Bennett and Beers) in a style that combines street theater and Commedia dell’Arte. A production of Many Moons, written by James Thurber and adapted by Brüka ensemble member and writer Michael Grimm, will have a public performance in the late spring at the McKinley Arts and Culture Center in Reno.

2007/2008 Main Stage Season
The current main stage production, Dirty Blond by Claudia Shear, originally performed off-Broadway by the author, is essentially a love story of two star-struck misfits obsessed with the phenomenal Mae West. The show runs Thursday – Sunday through March 1.

Remaining plays through July include intriguing titles like Fat Men in Skirts by Nicky Silver, Steambath by Jay Friedman, and the OBIE award-winning Cloud Nine by Caryl Churchill.

For show dates and information call (775) 323-3221 or visit www.bruka.org