Performances of The Greatest Generation Speaks about World War II take place in the 1940's era Vint Hill Theater on the Green in Warrenton, Virginia.

Fauquier Community Theatre is ready to greet you for this world premiere stage adaptation of Tom Brokaw's book The Greatest Generation Speaks. The play is adapted for stage by Harry J. Kantrovich and focuses on real life accounts of the World War II era portrayed by 30 actors.

The Greatest Generation Speaks will take place on Fridays and weekends between February 3 - 19, 2023. Friday and Saturday performances will take place at 7:30 pm and Sunday matinees are at 2 pm. The venue is located at 4225 Aiken, Drive, Warrenton, Virginia. The show opens on Friday, February 3 and will include an opening night reception of light refreshments following the performance.

The Greatest Generation Speaks is the stage adaptation of the 1999 sequel to Tom Brokaw’s #1 bestseller The Greatest Generation. The original book inspired many people to write in with their memories of the World War Two era. Mr. Brokaw received so many letters that he was inspired to publish a selection of them. With Mr. Brokaw’s cooperation, the book has been condensed for the stage. Real life accounts from men and women relating stories of service at the front as well as on the home front, and reflections on loneliness, loss, and love are portrayed.

The play strives to support Mr. Brokaw’s own reflection: “If we are to heed the past to prepare for the future, we should listen to these quiet voices of a generation that speaks to us of duty and honor, sacrifice and accomplishment. I hope more of their stories will be preserved and cherished as reminders of all that we owe them and all that we can learn from them.”

in The Greatest Generation Speaks.

Photo credit: Stephen Rummel Photography.

The Sunday matinee performances will feature various post-show talkback sessions directly after the play with expert panelists answering questions about the World War II era.

February 5 post show speaker: Major Bruce H. Norton, USMC (Ret.) has been a combat veteran, a career Marine Infantry Officer, a military museum director, and an adjunct military history professor, and is an award-winning author of numerous books on and about the United States Marines.

February 12 post show speaker: Alex Kershaw, a New York Times best selling author has written numerous books on World War II. He will speaking on the Battle of the Bulge based off of his book The Longest Winter: The Battle of the Bulge and the Epic Story of World War II's Most Decorated Platoon. Mr. Kershaw is also the chair of the Friends of the World War II Memorial.

February 19 post show speaker: Thomas J. Cutler is a former petty officer second class and retired lieutenant commander who has been serving the U.S. Navy in various capacities for more than fifty years. He has received numerous awards including the William P. Clements Award for Excellence in Education as military teacher of the year at the U.S. Naval Academy, and the Commodore Dudley Knox Lifetime Achievement Award in Naval History.

The Greatest Generation Speaks is produced by Don Richardson. Jones Group International based in Vienna, Virginia is the show sponsor. Support was also provided by Gromelski & Associates based in Manassas, Virginia. The photo of the theater marquee is by Jim Constable who plays Tom Brokaw in the play. The poster is designed by Bob Thompson.

Further reading is available in an article from January 19, 2023 by Constance Lyons in the Fauquier Times.Click HERE to read the feature story.

Season Tickets provide a discount for each production and are still available for the remaining 3 main stage shows. For more information, click on "Event Packages" at the top of the page HERE

Our Town is a 1938 play by American playwright Thornton Wilder which won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. The play tells the story of the fictional American small town of Grover’s Corners between 1901 and 1913 through the everyday lives of its citizens.

An American Classic: Our Town Coming to

A March 2023 production of Our Town is coming to Fauquier Community Theatre (FCT), located at 4225 Aiken Dr in Vint Hill. The show will open on March 10, with additional performances on Fridays and weekends from then until March 26.

Our Town is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American classic drama written by Thornton Wilder, set in the fictional town of Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire. In three acts, Wilder moves the audience through the cycles of ‘Daily Life’, ‘Love and Marriage’,

and ‘Death and Eternity’.

The play tells its story through the everyday lives of its small town citizens, in what was described by Edward Albee as “the greatest American play ever written”. First performed in 1938, with five Broadway revivals and countless performances in community theaters, colleges and high schools, it has remained popular over the years because of its simple story about everyday people.

In his 1992 book Conversations with Thornton Wilder, English professor Jackson R. Bryer wrote, "Wilder presents ordinary people who make the human race seem worth preserving and represent the universality of human existence."

Donald Margulies, a Pulitzer-prize winning playwright himself, teaches the craft at Yale University, and said, "Our Town is timeless; it is simple, but also profound, it is full of genuine sentiment, which is not the same as its being sentimental; and, as far as its being eventful, well, the event of the play is huge: it’s life itself.” [Donald Margulies, in the Foreward of Our Town, First Perennial Classics edition, Harper Collins, New York, republished 2003.]

Directed by Sonia Bronder Our Town is presented by special arrangement with Concord Theatricals on behalf of Samuel French, Inc. Tickets are available at www.FCTstage.org. Choose your favorite seating choices today!

Auditions for the musical Once Upon a Mattress.

Fauquier Community Theatre has chosen the musical Once Upon a Mattress as their annual spring youth production for a cast ages 8-18. Auditions for the musical are open to the public and will take place on Friday, March 3, 2023 and Saturday, March 4, 2023. The casting call will take place at the John Barton Payne Building (in Old Town Warrenton) located at 2 Courthouse Square, Warrenton, Virginia.

All roles are open and include those for a Princess…and a Prince…and a Queen and King…and ladies, knights, a jester, and for a whole cast of characters in FCT’s youth musical, Once Upon a Mattress. The 1959 comedy musical about the Princess and the Pea, famous for launching Carol Burnett into stardom, is making its Fauquier Community Theatre debut this summer!

With director Jack Tessier, choreographer Gabrielle Tessier, and music director Catie Murray, you are invited to bring this medieval, iconic, hilarious musical to life. Join a show with such fun songs like, “Normandy,” “Song of Love,” and the highly energetic dance, “Spanish Panic.”

From Jack Tessier, the director: "We need strong singers, dancers, and actors, ages 8 to 18. Please prepare a 90 second portion of a musical theatre song – I recommend researching the show and its characters to choose a song that will match the genre of the show."

Pre-registration for an audition is required. For more information and to register for an audition time, click on: FCTstage.org/auditions-2/ Once Upon a Mattress is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals. Performances for Once Upon a Mattress will take place on Fridays and weekends June 2 - 11 at the Vint Hill Theater on the Green located at 4225 Aiken Drive, Warrenton, VA. Tickets for reserved seating are available online at www.FCTstage.org.

ANNIE JR.

FCT Annie JR. Summer Camp Info and Registration Link.

June 2023 – FCT Summer Musical Theater Camp presents Annie JR. directed by Steve McBride with Assistant Director and Choreographer Christine Maxted. Ages: 8 – 18. Dates: June 26 - June 30, 2023 from 9 am to 5 pm at FCT. There will be a total of 3 performances on Friday June 30 and Saturday, July 1.

The musical theatre camp and all performances will take place at Fauquier Community Theatre: 4225 Aiken Drive, Warrenton, VA. For more information and to register, click on FCT Annie JR. Summer Camp Registration Link.

Based on the popular comic strip and adapted from the Tony Award-winning Best Musical, with a beloved book and score by Tony Award winners, Thomas Meehan, Charles Strouse and Martin Charnin, Annie JR. features everyone’s favorite little redhead in her very first adventure.

With equal measures of pluck and positivity, little orphan Annie charms everyone’s hearts despite a next-to-nothing start in 1930s New York City. Annie is determined to find the parents who abandoned her years ago on the doorstep of an orphanage run by the cruel Miss Hannigan. Annie eventually foils Miss Hannigan’s evil machinations, finding a new home and family in billionaire Oliver Warbucks, his personal secretary, Grace Farrell, and a lovable mutt named Sandy.

THE MUSIC MAN JR.

July 2023 - FCT Summer Musical Theatre Intensive presents The Music Man JR. directed by Jeff Walker with music director Doray Walker, choreographer Isabella McDonald, and assistant director Gia Obando. This program is geared for older youth for a Summer Musical Theatre Intensive of two weeks: July 10-14 and July 17-21, from 9:30 am to 2:30 pm, with a total of 4 performances July 21 - 23. The Walkers directed the summer camp at FCT last year producing Willy Wonka JR. Ages: Rising middle school students - graduating high school seniors. The FCT Summer Musical Theatre Intensive program is available to students via auditions that will take place in February 2023.

Based on Meredith Willson's six-time-Tony-Award-winning musical comedy, The Music Man JR. features some of musical theatre’s most iconic songs and a story filled with wit, warmth and good old-fashioned romance. The Music Man JR. is family entertainment at its best - a bold, brassy show that will have the whole town atwitter!

Master showman Harold Hill is in town and he’s got “seventy-six trombones” in tow. Can upright, uptight Marian, the town librarian, resist his powerful allure? The story follows fast-talking traveling salesman, Harold Hill, as he cons the people of River City, Iowa, into buying instruments and uniforms for a boys' band he vows to organize. The catch? He doesn't know a trombone from a treble clef. His plans to skip town with the cash are foiled when he falls for Marian, whose belief in Harold’s power just might help him succeed in the end in spite of himself.

The summer musical theatre program and all performances will take place at Fauquier Community Theatre: 4225 Aiken Drive, Warrenton, VA. For more information and to register: FCT The Music Man JR. Summer Musical Intensive Registration Link

Fauquier Community Theatre invites college-bound high school seniors with demonstrated abilities in the performing arts to apply for scholarships. The Scholarship Application for 2022 scholarships is due no later than April 1, 2023. There is a “Save and Continue” option to complete the application over time.

Fauquier Community Theatre (FCT) offers financial scholarships for local high school seniors who desire to pursue further education in the theatre arts. With the help of an FCT scholarship, young aspiring actors, actresses, musicians, and theatre technicians are aided in deferring the cost of higher education as they seek to acquire further training.

All applications are reviewed by a committee and will be scored using a rubric system. The college scholarship awards will be based on a rubric of scores that include grade point average, interest in a career in theatre, participation in Fauquier Community Theatre activities, other theater experience, short essay questions on the form, letters of recommendation, etc.

There will be at least two $1,000 scholarships offered in 2023. Criteria: A college-bound senior with demonstrated abilities in the performing arts. These scholarships will be paid directly to the recipient’s school of choice to cover tuition, books, fees, or room and board.

For more information including the link to apply, visit: FCTstage.org/scholarships/

Business sponsors and partnerships help us all build a better and more resourceful community. Fauquier Community Theatre sponsorships can be started at any time throughout the year. Whether as a new sponsor, or a returning one, it is easy to add your sponsorship. For more information and to see the list of sponsors, click on COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIPS. Please frequent the businesses of these generous sponsors, many have online services. Have your business front and center in the community with FCT. Questions? Email info@FCTstage.org or call FCT's executive director Debra Smyers at 540-349-8760.