Crest Area Theatre teases three 2025 projects

Chilly weather didn’t stop Crest Area Theatre from thinking about the summer while making early tentative plans for their productions of the year. The organization held their February general meeting on Monday, presenting ideas while taking the first steps of scheduling for the year.

CAT will once again apply for an Southern Central Iowa Community Foundation grant, which is awarded to organizations whose mission statement says they “contribute to a better life for people of South Central Iowa by helping donors to carry out their charitable intent.” CAT typically receives a grant for continued operations for their service to the local community.

Three different productions were discussed by CAT. Two of them were the standard summer and winter shows. The third, meant to be in collaboration with Creston Arts, is in the early stages, and would require more contact with Creston Arts before more major details are decided. Some ideas, which are not set in stone, include a murder mystery dinner.

The collaboration with Creston Arts would be beneficial for CAT, as the production could take place anytime through the year, and not based on the schedule of Southwestern Community College’s Performing Arts Center, where CAT typically performs their productions.

Ideas for the other two seasonal productions were proposed. Early progress was made on the summer production, with Jerry Huffman and Julia Weisshaar-Mullin tentatively assigned director and assistant director roles, respectively. Details around the summer production are not yet finalized.

A review of CAT’s 2024 winter production, “It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play” was held. The show, a reader’s theater style performance of a fictional radio station following the story of the original 1946 film, was held from Dec. 6-8, 2024. The show did not lose money for CAT when including licensing fees, ticket sales and other factors, but was still underwhelming.

“I thought the show deserved a bigger audience than what we got,” said Huffman, who serves at CAT’s treasurer and was a member of the audience for the performances. “Everyone was entertaining, that was a very good version of reader’s theater.”

Creatively, “It’s a Wonderful Life” was considered successful, with the CAT board complimenting the enthusiasm in box office and set building. Ellie Soosloff said her first time directing a CAT show was, “a great experience,” and was open to directing another show.