The 39 Steps Opens At Wabash

If you’re tired of being cooped-up because of COVID and just want to spend two hours laughing hysterically, get tickets for the Wabash Theater Department’s production of The 39 Steps, which opens February 23 and runs through 26 with performances at 8 p.m. each evening.

Tickets are free and can be reserved through the Fine Arts Center Box Office.

The 39 Steps is a zippy, rollicking adaptation of Alfred Hitchcock’s serious 1935 film that weaves in plenty of wit and whimsy, fast-paced action, and lots of laughs. Unlike Hitchcock’s movie, which featured dozens of actors, the stage version squeezes the cast down to four.

Rob Johansen, who has appeared on stage and backstage, is the play’s visiting director. He was last seen on stage in Biloxi Blues, and has also taught workshops on movement and stage combat and choreography, but in real life he plays a professional actor working across the Midwest.

“Wabash wanted me to teach to my strengths: comedy, farce, and physical comedy,” Johansen told The Bachelor. “And we thought this play would be a great vehicle for those things… It’s very physical. It’s very rigorous. And I think it’s phenomenal training for an actor.”

A mostly bare stage with a few moving set pieces and well-used trunks, ladders, window frames, and moving doors provide all the space for the actors to channel their talents into exaggerated movements.

Logan Weilbaker, coming off his performance in the lead role of Gregory in last fall’s production of The Amateurs, stars as Richard Hannay, a run-of-the-mill guy living a pretty boring life until he meets Anabella, who claims she is a spy who has uncovered important military secrets. When she ends up dead – in Hannay’s house – a hilarious manhunt begins from London to the Scottish Highlands.

Emilie Prince stars as Anabella Smith, while also playing two other women entangled by Hannay, Margaret and Pamela as he attempts to clear his name and uncover the spy network. Prince, a junior at DePauw majoring in English writing and Chinese, is making her Wabash stage debut.

The truly heavy lifting is done by Drew Johannes and Luke Fincher, known in the program as “Clown 1” and “Clown 2,” but the audience will see them in dozens of roles as the fast-moving comedy picks up speed.

The stage version of The 39 Steps ran on Broadway for over 770 performances, and won the Olivier Award for Best Comedy and Tony Awards for lighting and sound. The New York Times called it “absurdly enjoyable” and a “gleefully theatrical riff on Hitchcock’s film [that] is fast and frothy.”

Ace Dzurovcik is the Production Stage Manager, Carter Nevil is the Stage Manager, and Betsy Swift serves as the Assistant Director.

The production includes scenic design by Adam Whittredge, costume design by Alison Jones, lighting design by Quinten James, and music composition by Michael Abbott and students in Music 104 (Emiliano Delgado, Jeremiah Eaton, Cristian Aleman-Gonzalez, Jaemin Jo, Jack Nolan, and Cody Bevelhimer). Other crew members include Sarvik Chaudhary, Santiago Venegas, Emerson Courter, Kevin Ballard-Munn, Robert Borland, and Betsy Swift.

NOTE: In keeping with the College’s COVID-19 mitigation strategies, face masks are required during the performance.