Rep Stage Goes Out On A ‘Falsettos’ Note
'Falsettos' was the first musical Rep Stage produced 29 years ago and now it also serves as its very last.
In the early 1990s, Joseph Ritsch, then twentysomething and “very much just out of the closet,” was profoundly impacted when he happened to see Falsettoland, a work that later became part of the Tony-winning musical Falsettos by playwright and composer William Finn, with a book co-written by James Lapine.
“I was deeply moved, not only by the material, but just to see myself represented as a queer man on stage in a way I hadn’t before, as well as how it grapples with the AIDS crisis,” Ritsch recalls. “The musical really was pretty groundbreaking in how it was trying to redefine what family looks like in regards to biological family, chosen family, particularly as it relates to the LGBTQ community.”
Three decades later, Ritsch, now producing artistic director of Maryland’s Rep Stage, says Falsettos continues to have deep resonance, especially “in this moment, with what’s going on in our country, with the rights of LGBTQ folks being deeply threatened in many states, particularly with what conservatives are trying to define as family values.”
Falsettos, says Ritsch, “is really about family. And those of us who come together and call ourselves family, many times within our community, it has nothing to do with birth right or biological connection, [but] how we can shift and learn to kind of get out of our own way to support each other as family.”
Before the pandemic, Ritsch had planned a production of Falsettos as part of Rep Stage’s 2020/21 season. Instead, the musical will mark the final production of the 2022/23 season — and of the company itself.
Last fall, officials of Howard Community College announced that at the close of the school year, they would no longer fund or house the organization, thus bringing an end to Rep Stage’s 29-year reign as the rare professional equity theater institution in residence at a community college in the U.S.
“The college has decided to refocus funding to programs and services that directly serve students,” Ritsch says, quoting from the official announcement. “That’s really all I can say.” Ritsch doesn’t know more about the decision, which was announced with little to no advance notice.
“I didn’t expect, at 54 years old and in a job that I really loved, to be making this career shift. So my heart and brain is still really in the trenches in dealing with that.”
Ritsch signed on to lead Rep Stage in 2014 and has had full artistic license. “That’s always been something I’ve been very grateful for here,” he says. “The college has never said, ‘you can’t do this’ or ‘you have to do that.’ So that’s been really, really lovely. And the community has been really supportive as well.”
Over the course of its three decades, Rep Stage has produced more shows with LGBTQ content than is typical, especially given its size and suburban locale.
It was a reality that Ritsch only worked to emphasize, with productions ranging from Paula Vogel’s The Baltimore Waltz in 2015, to Dorian’s Closet, a world-premiere musical about a star of Paris Is Burning, in 2017, to E2, Bob Bartlett’s queer reimagining of Edward II, in 2019.
With Falsettos, he’s ensuring the company will go out on a high note — and in fact, the very same high note that launched the company.
“Falsettos was actually the first musical Rep Stage produced in its very first season,” he says. “So it’s kind of a full circle moment to end with it.”
Describing Falsettos as “one of my favorite musicals,” and also one that he has not previously directed, Ritsch says he decided to revive the pandemic-canceled show because “I also was invested in the artists that were already committed to the project back in 2020, giving them that work back. I’m grateful that all but one artist was able to continue with the project.”
When asked how things are going a week before the first curtain, Ristch says, “I’m biased, of course, but they’re a pretty stunning cast across the board, in my opinion. They’ve just really jumped into it in a really lovely way. I think audiences are going to be quite moved by the work that they’re doing.”
Falsettos runs through May 14 at The Horowitz Center’s Studio Theatre at Howard Community College, 10901 Little Patuxent Parkway, Columbia, Md. Tickets are $15 to $40. Visit www.repstage.org or call 443-518-1500.
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