Festival spotlights five plays about war
Combat veterans recount experiences
Stephan Wolfert’s journey to becoming a Shakespearean actor was quite a bit different than others’.
The La Crosse native was participating in U.S. Army desert training at Fort Irwin, California, soon after the first Gulf War ended when he saw a buddy killed in a training accident. Traumatized, Wolfert went AWOL and hopped a train to get away.
When he got off the train in Montana, he saw a performance of Shakespeare’s “Richard III.” The opening monologue — “now is the winter of our discontent” — spoke to Wolfert. Actually, it laid bare Wolfert’s soul.
Wolfert watched an actor portraying a warrior who was no longer a warrior because war was over. The warrior felt at home in the military but did not know how to fit into a society at peace. It was, in a way for Wolfert, looking into a mirror.
“It hit me so hard. I was heaving, I was laughing too loudly, the Greeks would call it a catharsis,” said Wolfert, who returned to his Army unit and served out the rest of his duty before going to graduate school to become an actor.
Wolfert turned his experiences into a one-person play, “Cry Havoc,” which is part of the first-ever National Veterans Theater Festival in Milwaukee over the Memorial Day weekend.
“Cry Havoc” merges monologues and couplets from “Richard III” and other Shakespeare plays with Wolfert’s own narrative. Theater helped Wolfert through a very difficult time in his life and he hopes his play, which has been staged in many states, can do the same for others.
When he began working on “Cry Havoc,” an average of 16 veterans committed suicide each day. Now it’s 20 veterans dying every day by suicide, according to the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs.
“The military wires us for war but doesn’t unwire us,” said Wolfert, 52. “At the end of the play, I talk about when I went into the military I had a recruiter who signed me up and told me about the Army. But when I got out I didn’t have a de-cruiter who helped me prepare for life after the military.”
Five plays — each lasting 90 minutes or less — will be performed at the Milwaukee Repertory Theater’s Stiemke Studio by professional actors who are also military veterans:
“And Comes Home Safe” by Feast of Crispian, 7:30 p.m. May 23. The Milwaukee group will perform Shakespeare scenes with original material based on the performers’ experiences.
“Color of Courage” by Mitch Capel and Sonny Kelly, 7:30 p.m. May 24. Based in Fayetteville, North Carolina, Capel and Kelly perform a series of stories about the 180,000 African American soldiers who served in the Union Army during the Civil War.
“She Went to War” by The Telling Project, 2 p.m. May 25. Premiering at The Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis in 2017, “She Went to War” is an autobiographical performance by four female combat veterans.
“AMAL” by Combat Hippies, 7:30 p.m. May 25. The play performed by an ensemble of Puerto Rican veterans from Miami is about the impact of war on combatants and non-combatants as well as life after war for warriors, refugees and asylum seekers.
“Cry Havoc” by Wolfert, 2 p.m. May 26.
The idea for the festival came from Feast of Crispian leaders. Named after the rallying cry in “Henry V,” Feast of Crispian helps veterans overcome trauma, emotional issues, substance abuse or difficulties reintegrating into society through the words of Shakespeare.
Over the last 51⁄2 years, Feast of Crispian has worked with 100 to 150 veterans each year through three-day acting workshops mostly at the Milwaukee VA Medical Center. The group also has a residency at the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.
The National Veterans Theater Festival will help “raise the profile of what’s going on in the veteran community and how arts have become really important in healing,” said Feast of Crispian co-founder Nancy Smith-Watson.
“And Comes Home Safe” features 14 Wisconsin veterans who participated in Feast of Crispian and helped create the play with vignettes of their experiences. The cast features a dozen men and two women from every military branch, spanning from Vietnam to post-9/11 eras.
While veterans gain strength through performing, audience members gain empathy and understanding of the experience of veterans, Smith-Watson said.
“I hope people get a very deep sense and appreciation of the resiliency and dynamism of our veteran population and also a deeper understanding of the consequences of putting our men and women into war zones,” said Smith-Watson.