1929: The Community Players
The first play, Dover Road, starred Marie Fennell and Tom Sinclair. It was performed in the old third-floor Killian Tea Room and played to a full house. Four more shows were produced in the first season: The Queen’s Husband, Outward Bound, The Famous Mrs. Fair, and You and I.
The Community Players production of “Outward Bound” played two days in the Killian Tea Room, 1930. Players (from left) were John Carey, Lael R. Abbott, Mark Anthony, George Farmer, Neil Montgomery, Fran Prescott, Tom Sinclair, Catherine Reid, and Ida McQuinn. Mary Lackersteen and Hazel Brown directed. Photo copyright by Stamats Publishing Co., Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
The Community Players flourished for the next ten years. Rehearsals and meetings occurred in the second floor space where Grant Wood and Marvin Cone also built and painted scenery. Any available stage was their place of production. They managed with private homes, church basements, the McKinley School auditorium, and finally the little theater at the YMCA, which the players helped remodel.
The social committee was so successful at organizing tryouts that those events often drew one hundred or more people. Doughnuts and coffee and the usual endless conversation were served afterwards. The after-show parties were spontaneous, and eventually the committees, casts and crews had to open them to the admiring public.
From the first, the Community Players knew the sort of project they wished to foster in the community. They intended their plays to both entertain and educate, and they insisted on the best possible production. As a result, there were productions that were truly excellent, many that were good, and a small share that were “noble stinkers.”
Then, in 1940, the war interrupted the Community Players, and live theatre produced by the group was halted for the duration of WWII.
