Out Front Theatre Company’s new show “At the Wedding,” a play by Bryna Turner, premieres Jan. 30 and runs through Feb. 15.
The play is billed as a sapphic spin on the typical wedding rom-com, following Carlo as she tries to make it through the wedding of her ex-girlfriend without trying to win her back. The show is directed by local director and actor Jennifer Alice Acker, who has previously directed holiday shows at Out Front. This marks her first non-holiday outing for the LGBTQ+ theater company.
When she first got the call to direct “At the Wedding,” Acker was drawn to the characters and the show’s contemporary feel. But it was the writing that really hooked her from the start.
“The language is unreal. Like, the writing is unbelievable. It’s one of my favorite plays I’ve read in a long time,” Acker said. “The language is almost poetry, at moments, but not this sort of avant garde poetry – really good, modern poetry that just sort of sticks you.”
When deciding whether or not to direct a play, Acker said the show needs to grab her pretty immediately in some visceral way. Some of the common throughlines in work she directs include a core of what she called “human truth,” a balance of comedy and tragedy, and a heightened sort of tone. Another thing she loved about “At the Wedding” is how contemporary it felt.
“Theater can sometimes feel a little like a dated art form, compared to TV and film,” she said. “It doesn’t feel that way at all. I was just hooked instantly.”
When casting the show, which has a large ensemble, Acker said chemistry was the most important thing.
“The challenge of casting is not finding someone good enough, or who can do it,” she said. “It’s what exact configuration of individuals do we want to tell this story? What version of the story do we want to tell?”
For auditions, actors first sent in video submissions. Out Front held in-person call-backs where different pairs of actors were able to do chemistry reads together. Then, it became a big old game of “chemistry tetris.”
The cast features Katie Wickline as Carlo, and also includes Aliya Kraar, Benjamin Sprunger, Femmaeve MacQueen, Wanyu Yang, Sofia Palmero, and more. A full cast list is available on Out Front’s website.
Acker said being an actor herself has affected the way she directs, giving her a shared language with her actors that helps them connect.
“You have a passing knowledge of the language and you also have a passing knowledge of what the behind the scenes work is,” she said. “I know what an actor’s work is to get to a moment. I know that an actor is not a puppet to be engineered. I know they need to bring their unique perspective and their journey to get to an outcome is nonlinear.”
“At the Wedding” is a co-production with Georgia College & State University’s Department of Theatre & Dance. GCSU put on the play back in September, and Out Front is using the same set for their production, as well as some props and costumes. Acker said this partnership made the rehearsal process much smoother, lessening the amount of time they had to restage things during tech week and allowing them to integrate props into the rehearsal process far earlier than normal.
“It was a really cool experience as a director,” she said. “I walked in on day one, and the set was done.”
Tickets for Out Front’s production of “At the Wedding” are available online.
