Historic Howmet sets another season

April, 15, 2007
Bill Iddings
Chronicle Staff Writer

Kevin Wurz is still so new to all this that he wasn’t quite certain what to call himself.

Asked what his official position would be this summer at the Howmet Playhouse, Wurz and Tom Harryman momentarily blanked.

“We’ll figure this stuff out,” said Harryman, the new manager of the historic, 91-year-old theater in Whitehall. “Kevin and I are kind of making this up as we go, ‘cause it’s so new.’

Sitting over a mid-afternoon lunch at Racquets Downtown Grill in Muskegon, Wurz and Harryman, on the spot, settled for Summer Theatre Director as Wurz’s title.

It comes as the Howmet Playhouse announces its 2007 summer season, a series of six productions during July and August at the 400-seat theater at 304 S. Mears.

Running from July 5 through Aug.25, the Summer Theater Festival will consist of a sextet of comedies: A.R. Gurney’s “Sylvia,” William Shakespeare’s “The Winter’s Tale,” Michigan based actor/playwright Jeff Daniels’ “Escanaba in da Moonlight,” “The Mystery of Irma Vep (A Penny Dreadful0” and playwright Ken Ludwig’s farce “Lend me a tenor”; and the White Lake Yourth Theatre troupe’s family show, “Stuarte Little.” Two of the shows, “Escanaba in da Moonlight” and “Lend me a tenor,” will run for two extended weeks. The other four will run for one.

For the main, adult productions, Harryman and Wurz are signing up a collection of professional actors and performers from West Michigan.

Coming in form out of town this summer will be several Howmet veterans, amon them professionals Brandon Zale, Michael Bradely, Jeremy Meyer, Jackie Cody, and Miranda McGee, along with newcomer Kristin Leahy; and such local actors as Shelia Kulp Wahamaki, Terry Ireland and Harryman, “The Winter’s Tale” will be imported, performed by the Grand Haven-based Pigeon Creek Shakespeare Company.

Several of the local actors will be reprising roles in shows they have done before: Wahamaki in the title role of “Sylvia” in which she plays a dog who fouls up a couple’s life. She previously played “Sylvia” for Muskegon Civic Theatre. Ireland and Harryman again will be in “Escanabe in da Moonlight,” a play they’ve performed together several times.

Wurz is back at the Howmet Playhouse after a dozen seasons running the playhouse each summer.

At the conclusion of the 2007 season, Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp, which owned The Howmet Playhouse, announces it was closing it because summer theater at Howmet annually lost money.

The White Lake community consisting mainly of the neighboring cities of Whitehall and Montague in northern Muskegon County – rallied to the rescue.

The city of Whitehall acquired the playhouse from BLFAC, and hired Harryman to run it. He is a Muskegon native and longtime professional actor who for around 15 years ran the Frauenthal Center for the Performing Arts in downtown Muskegon.

Harryman had directed for Wurz at Howmet. In short order, Wurz, who during the regular year is on staff at Lake Michigan College, was headed back to Howmet.

Volunteers in the White Lake area have been active in raising money to pay for the playhouse’s operation. Already they have held two concerts, a March 11 show at Scales Fish House & Steak restaurant by Dennis Stroughmatt & L’Esprit Creole; and Saturday’s performance at the playhouse of the Celtic-rock band Fonn Mor.

The goal is to eventually raise $200,000. If the volunteers accomplish that, an additional $100,000 will be matched by the Edna and Leonard Bloomdahl Fund that is administered through the Community Foundation of Muskegon County.

One way that Harryman and Wurz hope to keep the proverbial wolf from the door is to raise ticket prices. Tickets for regular shows have been $10 for adults and $9 for students and senior citizens. This season the tickets will cost $14 and $10.

“It’s out of necessity.” said Wurz. “For years I referred to (Howmet Playhouse) as the best theater bargain in Michigan.”

To Harryman, it still is.

“We are still the lowest summer-theater ticket prices in Michigan,” he said.

Tickets for the children’s show, “Stuart Little,” will be $7 and $5.

One thing Wurz and Harryman are continuing to work out is finding housing for actors who are coming to The Howmet Playhouse from out of the area. For years the Howmet acting company was able to stay at the stately Lewis House adjacent the playhouse’s parking lot. Because the house has been retained by BLFAC camp, though, it is no longer available.

House an actor: Harryman is asking residents who would like to house one or several of the actors to call him at 231-894-4048.