ARTS

UPAF celebrates a milestone b-day.

AS A MEMBER OF American Players Theatre’s core acting company, James Ridge does most of his performing in Spring Green. This month he’ll appear in Milwaukee Chamber Theatre’s production of The Few, Samuel D. Hunter’s 2014 play about an interstate trucker newsletter that publishes personal ads and articles about life on the road. Ridge let us ask him just what the heck we can learn from those personal ads.

How can erudite Milwaukeeans relate to a trucker newsletter?

Hunter writes about people who feel themselves out on the edges, who are desperately looking for connection. Who of us doesn’t feel like that at some point? Everybody else is the cool kid and I’m the one on the outside wishing I could go to that party or wishing that more people liked me. That’s certainly going on with Bryan, the character I play.

So what does he do about it?

[Bryan] abandons the newsletter – the thing and people that were most important in his life – and then comes back years later. You don’t return to the scene of the crime unless you’re hoping to reconnect.

Where do personal ads come in?

During the play, we hear from other people through an answering machine that records the personals: “Here’s my ad. Here’s how I sell myself. What about me? Choose me. Notice me.” Who doesn’t want to be seen, to be really known? That’s something we can all relate to.