Workhouse Theatre Company (WTC) is the only independent theatre company residing and producing in north Minneapolis. Based in the Camden neighborhoods

Camden, Minneapolis

Camden is a community in Minneapolis, covering the upper half of the north side. Its boundaries are 53rd Avenue North to the north, the Mississippi River to the east, Lowry Avenue North to the south, and Xerxes Avenue North to the west. The community is composed of seven smaller neighborhoods...

 of Minneapolis, WTC was established by Artistic Director Jeff Redman in 2004, under the name Camden Civic Theatre. The name was changed to Workhouse Theatre Company in 2006, although the theatre's dedication to Camden remains the same and WTC still maintains the title of the first and only independent theatre

Theatre

Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...

 company based in the Camden community.

Workhouse Theatre Company is a teaching theatre whose mission is to provide the residents of the Camden neighborhoods with an opportunity to attend and to participate in quality presentations of theatrical works. In addition to offering an assortment of inexpensive classes in acting

Acting

Acting is the work of an actor or actress, which is a person in theatre, television, film, or any other storytelling medium who tells the story by portraying a character and, usually, speaking or singing the written text or play....

 and improvisation

Improvisation

Improvisation is the practice of acting, singing, talking and reacting, of making and creating, in the moment and in response to the stimulus of one's immediate environment and inner feelings. This can result in the invention of new thought patterns, new practices, new structures or symbols, and/or...

, WTC offers a full theatrical season and regularly participates in community events such as Mississippi

Mississippi River

The Mississippi River is the largest river system in North America. Flowing entirely in the United States, this river rises in western Minnesota and meanders slowly southwards for to the Mississippi River Delta at the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains...

 Heritage Day and Holiday on 44th. Since 2006, most WTC productions have been staged at The Warren: An Artist Habitat on 44th and Osseo Road North.

Company history

• October 2003: The idea for a permanent independent theatre company in the Camden community was developed and then presented at a monthly Victory Neighborhood
  Victory, Minneapolis
  The Victory neighborhood is located within the Camden community of Minneapolis. It is bordered by the Humboldt Industrial Area on the north, Penn Avenue on the east, Dowling Avenue on the south, and the town of Robbinsdale on the west...
  
   Association meeting.

• October 2004: After a year of planning and structuring, founder Jeff Redman teaches the first series of beginning theatre classes offered by Camden Civic Theatre through the format of the Minneapolis Public Schools Community Education classes held at Henry High School
  Patrick Henry High School (Minneapolis, Minnesota)
  Patrick Henry High School, locally known as Patrick Henry, is a Minneapolis public high school located in the Camden area of North Minneapolis with about 1300 students...
  
  .

• March 2006: Camden Civic Theatre becomes officially incorporated with the State of Minnesota
  Minnesota
  Minnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...
  
  .

• August 2006: The company changes its name from the Camden Civic Theatre to the Workhouse Theatre Company.

Production history

• December 2004: A Snowbound Christmas Carol (company developed)
• March 2005: An Evening's Diversion (company developed)
• May 2005: An Evening of Nightmares (company developed)
• September 2005: Heritage Day Monologues by Valerie Borey
• November 2006: The Lottery by Shirley Jackson
  The Lottery
  "The Lottery" is a short story by Shirley Jackson, first published in the June 26, 1948, issue of The New Yorker. Written the same month it was published, it is ranked today as "one of the most famous short stories in the history of American literature"....
  
  
• June 2006: The Good Doctor by Neil Simon
• September 2006
  • The Guys by Anne Nelson
    The Guys
    The Guys is a play by Anne Nelson about the aftereffects of the collapse of the World Trade Center. In the play, Joan, an editor, helps Nick, an FDNY captain, prepare the eulogies for an unprecedented number of firefighters who died under his command that day...
    
    
  • Mississippi Running by Valerie Borey
• October 2006: night Mother by Marsha Norman
  'night, Mother
  'Night, Mother is a 1983 play by Marsha Norman about a daughter, Jessie, and her mother, Thelma . The play opens with Jessie calmly telling Mama that by morning she will be dead, as she plans to commit suicide that very evening...
  
  
• November 2006:Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus
  Prometheus Bound
  Prometheus Bound is an Ancient Greek tragedy. In Antiquity, this drama was attributed to Aeschylus, but is now considered by some scholars to be the work of another hand, perhaps one as late as ca. 415 BC. Despite these doubts of authorship, the play's designation as Aeschylean has remained...
  
  
• December 2006: Scenes from A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, adaptation by Valerie Borey
• January 2007: House by Daniel MacIvor
• February 2007: Love Letters by A.R. Gurney
  Love Letters (play)
  Love Letters is a Pulitzer Prize for Drama nominated play by A. R. Gurney. The play centers on just two characters, Melissa Gardner and Andrew Makepeace Ladd III...
  
  
• March 2007: No Exit by Jean Paul Sartre
  No Exit
  No Exit is a 1944 existentialist French play by Jean-Paul Sartre. The original French title is Huis Clos, the French equivalent of the legal term in camera, referring to a private discussion behind closed doors; English translations have also been performed under the titles In Camera, No Way Out...
  
  
• June 2007: A Company of Wayward Saints by George Herman

External links

• Workhouse Theatre Company
• The Warren: An Artist Habitat