Back in the game: Delaware Theatre's 40th season opens with football-themed ‘Sanctions’
Catharine Slusar describes herself as “a fan – just not a fan of football.”
So, while it is unlikely to find her drafting a fantasy football team or tailgating, the Philadelphia-area actor still understands what it means to feel passionate about something.
“It gives you a community, it gives you instant camaraderie with people you don't even know,” Slusar said. “There's this idea that you just put on a shirt and somebody else with the same shirt says, ‘Go Eagles.’ And I love that idea and I love community.”
Just as football fans recently kicked off a new season, so too did the Delaware Theatre Company. On Wednesday, DTC’s 40th season opened with the world premiere of football drama “Sanctions” by Bruce Graham. It revolves around Slusar’s character Claire Torrance, an academic adviser for student-athletes whose love for the game falters following scandal and NCAA sanctions.
It’s a serious start to the season, but not out of touch with patron interests, said DTC executive director Bud Martin.
“The long-term subscribers really yearn for strong dramas,” said Martin, who directs “Sanctions” himself.
According to a recent DTC survey, subscribers are most looking forward to the season’s two dramas, “Sanctions” and an adaptation of George Bernard Shaw's “Saint Joan” (Feb. 6-24), which DTC commissioned playwright Chelsea Marcantel to write with a more powerful female voice.
Director's take: Why Bud Martin picked 'Sanctions' to open season
When Martin joined DTC in 2012, he focused on reinvigorating the theater with contemporary works. The upcoming five-production season will also include restaurant comedy “Fully Committed” (Oct. 17-Nov. 4), the regional premiere of 1960s musical “A Sign of the Times” (Nov. 28-Dec. 23) and ugly duckling-inspired family musical “Honk!” (April 17-May 12).
While Martin sees the milestone season as a continuation of DTC’s current vision, what may be more notable to patrons is the revamped theater lobby, part of roughly $2 million in renovations that also updated the stage, backstage equipment and roof.
It’s a long way from where DTC started, in an abandoned firehouse at Third and French streets as part of the regional theater movement of the 1970s.
By opening with “Sanctions,” DTC will build on some of its recent history and lessons learned. Playwright Graham was also behind DTC’s successful 2017 production of “White Guy on the Bus,” a similarly charged and timely drama that transferred Off-Broadway, where it earned a New York Times Critics' Pick.
It’s also the second football-themed play Graham and Martin have worked on together, the first being “Any Given Monday,” a dark comedy that opened DTC’s 2013-14 season.
Although it may be surprising given the content of “Sanctions,” Graham loves sports. He is also playwright of “The Philly Fan,” has appeared on sports talk radio, was quoted in the book “If Football's a Religion, Why Don't We Have a Prayer?” and delights in discovering fellow sports enthusiasts in the region’s theater community.
“You can go into rehearsal and complain about last night's game and stuff,” Graham said. “I just see it as another form of entertainment. I'm an entertainer.”
Graham wrote “Sanctions” to explore the characters who come out of the high-pressure world of college football, not the game itself. Audiences won’t find themselves on the field, but they will find themselves in the screening room and tutor's office, and hear ambient sounds of marching bands and cheering.
Viewers may come out thinking about issues of race, entitlement, economics, community and education, but Graham said there’s no “message” he is trying to bring home.
In working on the play, Graham pulled from the real-life story of Jan Kemp, a former English instructor who exposed the University of Georgia for passing failing athletes in the 1980s, and talked with Martin about more recent scandals at Ole Miss, Penn State and the University of North Carolina.
The cast reviewed football references, like what it means to run a 40-yard dash in 4.3 seconds and talked about the Netflix documentary series “Last Chance U” and the book “The New Plantation: Black Athletes, College Sports, and Predominantly White NCAA Institutions.”
The conversations will continue with audiences through talkbacks, guest speakers and special panels on athletics, race and sexual assault.
As part of that community outreach, representatives from the YWCA Delaware Sexual Assault Response Center visited the theater to talk with the cast and DTC employees before opening night. The two-hour training session was meant to prepare DTC for conversations that may arise following the play.
It was a particularly meaningful lesson for Slusar, whose character in “Sanctions” is a “secondary survivor,” or someone, like a spouse or counselor, who is close to a survivor and impacted by their trauma.
In real life, Slusar is also a professor of theater at Bryn Mawr College who encourages her students to be curious and ask questions, as well as the mother of two teenage girls preparing for college.
While “Sanctions” is filled with difficult subjects to unpack, Slusar hopes the play “fires people up” and moves audiences – no matter what they are fans of – to take ownership of their communities, especially in light of the Me Too movement.
“As scary as it is to do that, when you do, other people stand up and you give each other courage in your community as well as friendship,” Slusar said. “Maybe that's what you get from this, that being a fan comes with responsibility for your community and what your community does.”
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If you go
WHAT: World premiere of “Sanctions” by Bruce Graham. When a university athletics department returns to the big business of college football after its NCAA probation is lifted, staff conflict and a new scandal involving a freshman tutor threaten to blow up the whole program.
WHERE: Delaware Theatre Company, 200 Water St., Wilmington, Delaware
WHEN: Runs through Sept. 30.
TICKETS: $25 and up
FOR MORE INFORMATION: Call (302) 594-1100 or go to www.delawaretheatre.org
OF NOTE: All performances of “Sanctions” will be followed by a post-show community discussion led by DTC staff. Guest speakers will include the cast of “Sanctions” on Sept. 13 at 10 p.m., Charlie Wilson of Delaware State University on Sept. 20 at 10 p.m., and Alonna Berry of Teach For America Delaware on Sept. 27 at 9 p.m.
Additional programming
Breaking the Silence, Sept. 22, 4 p.m. Free. This panel focusing on sexual assault on college campuses will include Melissa Bader-Huesgen, a residence hall coordinator at the University of Delaware; Joanne Sampson, a sexual violence prevention specialist at the University of Delaware; and Natalie Walton, a junior at the University of Delaware and president of It’s On Us, a student organization working to mobilize students against sexual violence.
Athletes in Academia, Sept. 29, 4 p.m. Free. This panel focusing on recruitment and balancing education will include Linda Van Drie Andrzjewski, director of athletics at Wilmington University, and Jan Blade, chair of the department of sport management and the director of the sport administration graduate program at Delaware State University.
Dara McBride is a Wilmington freelance writer.