Theater often has the power to calm and comfort audiences in unsettling and disquieting days. UMD’s Anne of Green Gables is just such a theater piece. While not without its pathos and sadder moments, it is a quaint, funny, and uplifting show that charmed the opening night audience.
Guest director Julie Ahasay and her eleven-member student cast create an idyllic world, both from Anne’s vibrant imagination and the imagery of the peaceful Canadian Prince Edward Island of the late 19th/early 20th century.
Based on the endearing 1908 book by author Lucy Maud Montgomery, the play tells the story of an elderly brother and sister, Matthew (Trey Duncanson) and Marilla Cuthbert (Katherine Warmka), living an isolated life on their remote farm.
When 12-year-old orphan Anne Shirley (Mary Cruser) breezes into their lives, the siblings find new energy and a sense of purpose in making a home for the girl.
Duncanson is an audience favorite from the first as Matthew, a man of few words, with often just his occasional grunt in response to questions. He and Anne form an indelible bond, finding the emotional connection both have long needed. Duncanson’s spot-on characterization of a man who finds love for an unexpected daughter late in his life provides some of the most heartwarming scenes in the show.
“Where’s the boy? . . .We sent word to Mrs. Spencer to bring a boy,” is Marilla’s instant reaction to meeting Anne, upset about the orphanage mix-up of not sending a boy to help Matthew with farm chores. Warmka shows well the contrast between wanting to send Anne back to the orphanage immediately and eventually warming up to Anne as she, too, finds the girl a ray of light and energy in what had been a dull and stagnant existence.
The sometimes giggly and silly and sometimes disapproving “chorus” of school girls eventually gives Anne the friendships she has so longed for in her solitary life. As one of her schoolmates. Diana Berry, Natalie Neuschwander, convincingly serves as a lady-like contrast to Anne and becomes her instant “bosom friend“ and “kindred spirit.”
As Anne’s nemesis and fellow student, Gilbert Blythe, whom she can “never forgive” after he makes fun of her “cursed” red hair, Tanner Dorschner’s acting is a bit wooden at times. Later, he has moments of genuine charm that the girls, other than Anne, see in him. Eventually, he wins Anne over, too, becoming her future love interest.
Cruser in the role of Anne Shirley portrays all the teenage angst required, while also showing the intelligence, pluckiness, and wit of this truly remarkable character. She is engaging in the role, most believable as she shows the passage of time as the years go by, and Anne grows into a mature young woman.
While Cruser looks markedly older than the other girls, particularly early in the show, when she is referred to several times as a “little” girl, she wins the audience over with her character’s unbridled energy and wild imagination.
It is Cruser’s recreation of Anne’s imaginative mind that captivated the audience from the first, with her seeing an avenue of blossoming apple trees and renaming it “The White Way of Delight” and calling a humble pond, “The Lake of Shining Waters.”
Curtis Phillis’ multi-leveled set with wooden platforms, ramps, and stairs gave varied playing spaces, without the need for moving many set pieces. A rear scrim was used creatively for projections from designer Erika Tourdot, creating ambiance for different scenes with color and shading. Projecting images such as leaves and snowflakes around the proscenium was also effective in showing seasons and the passage of time.
Anne of Green Gables is the final show as costume designer for Laura Piotrowski, UMD’s costume supervisor of over 40 years, who is retiring this spring. For Anne of Green Gables, her designs, especially with Anne’s drab costumes at first, contrasted with the other girls’ contrasting colorful dresses and skirts, were critical to the show’s overall look.
Congratulations to Piotrowski for a stellar career in designing over 50 shows at UMD and many shows for other theaters in town as well. Her Anne costumes helped to establish time, place, and character, immersing the audience in a world well past.
Read our artist profile story on Laura here: UMD Theatre’s Costume Visionary Laura Piotrowski Retires After 40+ Years
Spending a few hours in the idyllic, mythical town of Avonlea, at the house with the green gables, was a delightful way to spend an autumn evening. Audiences of all ages will find this setting and show, much like the Gilmore Girls’ Stars Hollow, a welcome retreat from daily life and news headlines.
Information on Anne of Green Gables
Adapted by Peter DeLaurier
Directed by Guest Artist Julie Ahasay
Marshall Performing Arts Center – Mainstage Theatre
Remaining Run:
Oct 15–17 | 7:30 PM
Oct 18 | 2:00 PM (ASL Performance) & 7:30 PM
Buy tickets here: destinationduluth.co/UMDTheatreTickets
When aging brother and sister Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert send word to an orphanage in Nova Scotia for a boy to help them on the farm, they get more than they bargained for: hot-headed, 11-year-old Anne Shirley. Over the course of six years, this imaginative, brilliant, and energetic girl wins their hearts and turns a stodgy, rural Canadian community into a bright world of kindred spirits. This swift yet theatrical adaptation of the classic novel is an all-ages crowd-pleaser.
Coming Next to UMD Theatre
The Women of Lockerbie
by Deborah Brevoort Directed by Matthew Olsen
Nov 14,15, 2025 | 7:30 pm
Nov 16, 2025 | 2:00 pm
Nov 19, 20, 21, 2025 | 7:30 PM
Nov 22, 2025 | 2:00 PM (ASL Performance) & 7:30 PM
A mother from New Jersey roams the hills of Lockerbie, Scotland, looking for any remains of her son, who was lost in the crash of Pan Am 103. She meets a group of local women who are fighting the U.S. government to obtain the clothing of the victims found in the plane’s wreckage so they can wash and return them to their families. Loosely inspired by a true story and written in the structure of a Greek tragedy, the show is a poetic drama about the triumph of love over hate.
