MinnPost Asks: Bain Boehlke

Photo by Michal Daniel

For half a century, Bain Boehlke has been a part of the Twin Cities theater community — first as an actor, and then as a designer and director. For the last 20 years, he has led the Jungle Theater, turning it into a cultural anchor for the Lyn-Lake neighborhood. He has earned numerous kudos, including being named the 2009 McKnight Foundation Distinguished Artist.

Boehlke, 70, has just returned from a yearlong sabbatical (in truth, he spent about half the year away and half at the theater), in time for the Jungle's 20th anniversary season. Noel Coward's "Blithe Spirit" opened Feb. 12 (and will run through March 28); the season will feature six plays, including "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" and "The Glass Menagerie," both directed by Boehlke.

Bain Boehlke: In 1986, I was on a beach in Mexico and the "Jungle Theater" came into my mind. I came back and moved to Lake Street. I went around the corner from my apartment and saw an empty storefront and these empty apartments above it. So I rented it and set up in one of the empty apartments with a card table and a calendar. I put up butcher paper in the windows that said "Coming: Jungle Theater." I had no big plans for it at all.

When you have nothing, possibilities are easy to recognize. The theater was an amazing instant success. I would walk into that little 90-seat theater and it would be rocking with laughter. I could not believe this was actually happening.

MP: What did you think of the original location?

BB: I loved it. The chief characteristic of it was the intimate relationship between the audience and the stage. The dynamic was truly quite perfect in a poetic, mathematical sense. It was also peopled by mature artists. ... The work on the stage is of a high quality, from the scenic design to the acting to the music. It's a rare event to go to a small theater and see something of such a high quality.

MP: Were you worried you would lose the unique feel of the theater when you moved?

BB: The new theater is somewhat larger, but when we developed the plans, we designed it with the same number of rows. The proscenium is larger, and some days I felt I was in Northrop Auditorium.

MP: The Jungle is known for putting on classic works — how do you approach them to make them "fresh" for a modern audience?

BB: I'm put out when they're called warhorses. These are seasoned plays and are such wonderful vehicles for the audience to participate in. In America, we are caught up so much with the new, but issues of the human heart are as old as the hills.

If you do the older plays you can get to the heart of the matter. They will tell you why they've been embraced by generations of theatergoers. "Blithe Spirit" has lasted not because it's Noel Coward, but because audiences have found it worthy in a universal way. So often, theater feels plays have to updated, but if they are respected for the cultural environment within which they live, they reveal a greater spirit than if they were forced to live in our time.

MP: The Jungle is also known for its often-realistic design. What drives that approach?

BB: I like to see people behaving in the little prisons that they've built. Recognition of the truth of the environment and human behavior is what creates comedy and laughter. It is just the fact of recognition. Theater has a dimensionality to it. It's not a book or a movie, it's actually happening before our eyes.

MP: What has helped the theater endure for the past two decades?

BB: One thing about this theater, unlike other theaters, we have a legitimate repertory system, so we can bring a play back just as it was done a decade before. You can see it on the same set and with the same actors. It will be more richly performed as they grow as performers and return to the roles. So for the shows we're bringing back for the 20th anniversary, if you think you've seen them before, think twice.

Many of the people in our audience have been with us for 20 years. It brings an audience to the theater that is rich in experience — they don't come in with an expectation. The Jungle doesn't have a style. We do the shows as the playwright intended instead of putting our own stamp on it. (The audience) knows what they will see will be of high quality.

MP: You're at an age when most people have retired. What keeps you going?

BB: For me, there is a lot of work I haven't done yet. The Jungle has done a lot of the smaller chamber plays. I would like to do the Scottish play or "The Miracle Worker."

The sabbatical was not only a great gift for me but also for the theater. It gave Joel [Sass, the Jungle's associate artistic director] a great opportunity to do something really tough, and it showed that the Jungle can survive under other leadership. It also gave me time to see the theater in a simpler, more pure way and to understand our future a little better. When midsize theaters reach this juncture, they are often so far from the vision of the founders, and don't have the energy anymore. I am present. I have gone through renewal. We have arrived at the place in the river where we should be.

Ed Huyck is a Minneapolis-based arts and entertainment writer who covers theater for MinnPost. This interview has been condensed.