Wisconsin church turns basement storage room into intimate theater hosting professional shows

[Episcopal News Service] Inside St. Christopher’s Episcopal Church in River Hills, Wisconsin, a short walk down a flight of stairs gets you to a small but inviting basement room with plain gray walls and black rafters. Professional-grade spotlights hang from a grid above, and risers spaced around the edges of the room can be configured to accommodate up to 100 fans of local theater.

While Sunday mornings in the nave at St. Christopher’s are still about preaching the Gospel, the congregation has expanded its reach into the community by reimaging this former storage space and developing a partnership with Acacia Theatre Company, a 45-year-old theater troupe that is rooted in the Christian tradition.

“Everyone who hears there’s a theater in the basement, they walk in and go, ‘Oh, this is kind of nice!” Janet Peterson, Acacia’s artistic director, told Episcopal News Service. “I love it. I think it works really well for the size of theater that we are.”

Episcopalians have gathered for nearly 70 years to worship at St. Christopher’s in River Hills, a bucolic northern Milwaukee suburb. Acacia has rented the basement theater at St. Christopher’s for its productions since 2019, staging several shows a year in this unique, intimate space, now named the Norvell Commons.

Acacia’s shows, such as the Jane Austin-inspired “Christmas at Pemberley” last December and “A Sleep of Prisoners” opening March 7, draw theater fans from around the region, some of whom are new to The Episcopal Church. Members of St. Christopher’s also often attend the shows and have welcomed this transformation of what had been a little-used room on the church’s campus.

“It brings people from a wide variety of interests, which we love,” the Rev. Geoffrey Ward, St. Christopher’s rector, said in an ENS interview. “We really believe that a multiple-entry-point and multiple-generational approach to things is what leads us to congregational vitality.”

St. Christopher’s had some key ingredients in forming a successful partnership with Acacia, starting with Ward’s educational background. He has a bachelor’s degree in theater and a master’s degree in children’s theater education. Ordained a priest in 2009, Ward began serving at St. Christopher’s in 2017, and before long, he was engaging with leaders in the local theater community while assessing the church’s facilities or possible new uses.

The church, built in the late 1950s, had undergone an expansion in 2006 to add facilities for church administration and fellowship. The space under that addition, however, had been left unfinished and became a kind of congregational junk room, Ward said, sometimes referred to as “the cave.”

“We decided this is not the optimum use of this space,” he said. He thought it seemed ideal for a theater.

At the same time, Acadia had been producing shows at a series of different locations in the region, none quite perfect for its smaller productions and modest but loyal audiences. Peterson connected with Ward through a mutual acquaintance, who happened to be working on props for Acacia, and they agreed that the basement at St. Christopher’s could be turned into a fitting new home for the theater company.

Acacia, named for a tree that symbolizes stability and resistance, describes itself as “an independent, non-profit, interdenominational Christian theatre company.” It was founded to integrate art and faith, and though its productions are not overly didactic, they typically develop themes that align with Christian teachings.

The theme of the 2024-25 season, for example, is “Making Peace,” based on the Bible verse from Matthew 5:9: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.”

Acacia has “a really solid reputation” in the local theater community, Ward said, so bringing the troupe on board to use the basement at St. Christopher’s helped solidify the congregation’s efforts to turn it into Norvell Commons, named for a former rector.

The project cost about $150,000, raised from a mix of sources, including the church’s endowment, grants and church member contributions. Acacia also pays a building use fee for its productions. Much of the development cost was for the theater’s state-of-the-art technology, from the lighting to movable seating. “Everything is flexible and changeable,” Ward said.

The theater also provides opportunities for church-based events, such as movie nights. Part of the budget covered a 12-foot screen, a high-quality projector and surround sound. The congregation also has hosted speakers and is looking for other community groups interested in renting the space.

Acacia began staging its productions there in fall 2019, but that first season soon was halted early the next year by the initial outbreaks of COVID-19. The church and the theater have since put pandemic restrictions on gathering behind them, and both are looking forward to increasing use of the theater at Norvell Commons.

“I haven’t figured out how to do a musical in there, but I’m OK with that,” Peterson said. Instead, Acacia’s productions are more actor-focused, with the audience close to the action on three sides.

“I like that you could reach out and touch the person in the first row,” she said.

– David Paulsen is a senior reporter and editor for Episcopal News Service based in Wisconsin. He can be reached at dpaulsen@episcopalchurch.org.