Milwaukee’s First Stage Children’s Theater is known for commissioning and producing new works by some cutting edge playwrights. But they probably went as far as they could go to find the writer for their current world premiere production, The Snow, by playwright FineganKruckemeyer.
Kruckemeyer lives in Hobart, Tasmania, the island state just off the southern coast of Australia. Because of the great distance between here and there, the first time Kruckemeyer saw his own show performed was after it opened late last month. But for him that could be a good thing.
"The process that has to happen in a rehearsal room, it can be quite a brutal one for a writer to bear witness to," he says. "Words have to be tested for their strength, pushed and pulled and put through their paces. And eventually come out as these things which are co-owned."
The Snow tells the story of a young group of adventurers thrust into the world to save their village. The play has many layers, which appeal to both young and older audiences.
"I always subscribe to that notion, whenever sitting down to write a piece of children's theater, I actually quite actively just try to write a piece of theater and then look at how it might have to be tweaked," Kruckemeyer says.
