DULUTH — This September marks the 10th anniversary of Duluth's decision to rebrand the stretch of East Superior Street formerly known as "Old Downtown" and call it the "Historic Arts and Theater District."
It hasn't been an easy decade for the performing arts, with the coronavirus pandemic proving a generational challenge to organizations that were never operating on comfy margins. Still, the district has bounced back and is now offering more original theater than it has in recent memory.
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Duluth Playhouse, which now owns the NorShor Theatre, is presenting full seasons of mainstage shows, youth performances and, in its Lab black-box space, "Underground" plays. The Boat Club restaurant has begun staging work at Fitger's Spirit of the North Theater.
And Zeitgeist, the sprawling and scrappy nonprofit that runs a complex at 222 E. Superior St., is also back to presenting full seasons of original productions. After a successful 2024 season under the name Zeitgeist Theater, the organization is about to launch a 2025 season with six productions.
"We sold out four out of five of our entire runs of these shows," said Mary Fox about the 2024 season. "We had to add performances."
Fox is producing artistic director at Zeitgeist, where she landed in 2018. A UMD theater graduate who has worked in New York and the Twin Cities, Fox is also co-creator of the radio-play-style podcast "Take It With You."
Zeitgeist, founded by Alan H. Zeppa in 2005 as a family foundation, opened the doors of its Teatro Zuccone a year later. The full Zeitgeist Arts complex officially opened in 2009, adding a movie theater and restaurant. The nonprofit pivoted to operating independently in 2014, as the recession-shaken Zeppa was forced to reduce his financial support.
From the beginning, Zeitgeist has been closely entwined with Renegade, a local theater company founded in 1991. Zeppa always saw that company as being a resident in his new venue. (Prior to opening the Teatro, Zeppa explored the possibility of buying and renovating the NorShor Theatre for that purpose.)
Over the years, Renegade went from being a Zeitgeist tenant to, effectively, merging with the latter organization. The former Renegade Comedy Theatre became simply Renegade Theater in 2010, and original theatrical productions of all types opened under the Renegade umbrella.
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Still, Renegade never entirely shook its close association with comedy, particularly as its sketch and improv programs made a successful post-pandemic return. Those shows are now listed on Zeitgeist's website under a "Live Comedy" heading, with a separate heading for "Live Theater."
Robert Lee, Renegade's managing director, explained that the split was intended "to help people understand, OK, we'll let Renegade be the name for comedy at Zeitgeist, and then we'll have this other stuff we call 'Zeitgeist Theater.'"
"Since theater has been happening in this space, Zeitgeist has had a hand in producing," explained Zeitgeist Executive Director Tony Cuneo. "It's always wanted to play some role in curating and supporting that work."
"When we emerged out of the pandemic, with Zeitgeist, it took a little bit longer for us to get back into doing our mainstage produced shows," explained Fox. "When we hit 2024 (it) was like, OK, this is it! We're back. We've got some breath underneath us."
At the same time, Duluth Playhouse was consolidating at the NorShor, moving out of the Depot and producing its Underground series at the Teatro for a year before opening the Lab in 2023. Fox said she's in close communication with Playhouse leaders to ensure the organizations are, as much as possible, complementing one another rather than directly competing.
Last year, Zeitgeist also launched a theater camp for youth that culminated in children joining adult actors in an outdoor production of "A Midsummer Night's Dream." (A 2025 youth camp is "in the works," according to Fox, although one hasn't yet been officially announced.)
"That was fun for the young people, to see and have the adult mentors there," said Cheryl Skafte, who helped to run the camp. "The urgency of putting (the show) together so fast created this intensity and energy that was just beautiful."
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Another distinctive production was "Macbeth," staged as a dinner party at Zeitgeist's restaurant.
"I was like, 'Are people going to want to eat and watch this show about murder?'" Fox remembered. "It turns out, people really want to do that."
Lee, who directed "Macbeth," said that Zeitgeist is "a smaller theater, so the budgets are smaller, but you get to take a chance on shows."
The word "edgy" tends to come up when discussing Zeitgeist Theater. For a sense of why, consider that all three HART companies produced musicals over the most recent holiday season. Duluth Playhouse did Rodgers and Hammerstein's "Cinderella," while Boat Club Productions had "Winter Wonderettes."
Zeitgeist, for its part, hosted Gaelynn Lea and Kevin Kling with their original musical fable engaging disability culture. A warm-hearted and accessible production, "Invisible Fences" didn't turn theater on its head, but the show was unique, with a forthright perspective.
"Part of infusing creativity into a community is allowing artists to express themselves in all the creative and diverse ways they want to express themselves," said Cuneo. "If they don't have a home for that, they'll leave."
This year's Zeitgeist season includes a production of "String" (Feb. 13-22), by Duluth playwright and theater artist Jessica Lind Peterson. In "American Son" (April 3-12), according to the show description, "an estranged biracial couple must confront their feelings about race and bias after their son is detained by the local police following a traffic stop incident."
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The season also includes "Rent" (July 31-Aug. 9), the boundary-busting '90s musical about life during the AIDS epidemic; and Yasmina Reza's fractious domestic drama "God of Carnage" (Nov. 13-22).
Between those shows, Zeitgeist is producing an original adaptation of Arthur Schnitzler's 1897 examination of sexual morality. Lee is adapting and will direct "La Ronde."
"It's about these interactions (among) different levels of society," explained Lee, who noted that while the show won't contain any depictions of sexual activity, each scene unfolds in the aftermath of a sexual encounter: a vulnerable and intimate space. "We can say sex is less taboo today, but I don't think that's true."
"I think we need to talk about some of these topics and issues," said Fox, "and what better way to do that than with art and theater?"
The season opens with "What the Constitution Means to Me" (Jan. 16-25), a play inspired by writer Heidi Schreck's youthful history giving speeches about the U.S. governing document. Skafte takes the role of the playwright in the show, which is set in an American Legion hall.
"There are those accordion doors," said Skafte, describing the set for the show. "They carpeted the stage. You really feel like you're in the space."
Skafte previously played the same role in a 2023 Rubber Chicken Theater production of the play. She said that just over a year later, the show is even more timely.
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"With the inauguration coming up, with how divided people feel, this desire to have conversations is really important to me," said Skafte. The play, she added, "asks people to think about how the Constitution and the world of politics is playing out in their life."
"Theater is play," said Fox. "It opens up new relationship connections. It opens artists up to be able to tap into who they are ... then you find other people in this community that are equally supportive and want this to happen."
Whether a show is happening in a theater, in the woods, or in a restaurant, Fox continued, when "you have people show up to see that, there is nothing better. I think that's how we learn, that's how we grow."
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