A thief, a priest, and a team of detectives are just a few of the characters you will meet in all for One productions’ Father Brown.

On their website, the play is described like this: “London is once again confounded by the notorious thief, Flambeau. Scotland Yard detectives team with an unlikely ally: the humble and unassuming priest, Father Brown. 

“Patrick Rieger’s faithful adaptation weaves together four of author G.K. Chesterton’s beloved mystery stories, which combine humor and intrigue with themes of forgiveness, redemption, rationality, and faith.” 

The contents of the play are suitable for those middle school and older, and presents an uplifting message during the course of six performances at PPG ArtsLab from Sept. 20-29.

Local Talent On Stage

This show will feature nine talented local artists, most of whom are no strangers to afO shows or Fort Wayne community theater. 

Jeff Salisbury, who will be playing Inspector Valentine, was featured in a 2014 Whatzup interview where he said, “I just completely believe in what (afO) do and what they represent. They create an amazing atmosphere and refreshing theater experience for actors and audience members.”

The titular role of Father Brown will be played by afO newcomer Andrew Rodenbeck, while Flambeau, the notorious thief, will be played by Timothy Deal. The rest of the cast includes Amanda Johnson, Matthew Williams, Rachel Walker, Nate Chen, Isaiah Powers, and Naka Piohia, many of whom will play multiple roles.

“The show was originally written for eight,” said Artistic Director Lauren Nichols. “We added an additional male to double some roles. It took some pressure off. There were some tricky costume changes and it allowed everybody to have enough to do, but not too much.”

Weaving Together the Story

Turning four of Chesterton’s short stories into one play could be tricky, but Father Brown does it very well. 

“The playwright has woven together a coherent story out of four of the detective stories in Chesterton’s first book of Father Brown,” Nichols said. “He’s done it very cleverly with several characters that we follow throughout the play, including a detective inspector and his second in command, a young woman who lives in London, and a thief that Chesterton used in multiple of his stories named Flambeau.”

Nichols has a particular appreciation for the arc of one character in particular.

“Flambeau’s character really has the most thorough character arc, going from criminal to reformed,” she said.

Playing a character that changes so radically can be a challenge, but Nichols and the actors come with experience. 

“Our actors all understand this arc because they’re all people of Christian faith, so they’ve all experienced this kind of radical transformation.” 

Getting Creative with Challenges

Nichols said because most of the dialogue comes straight from Chesterton’s works, it presents a unique challenge to her as a director. 

Some of the language is not commonly used today, and Chesterton also dives deep into some philosophical queries. 

“Chesterton presents many ideas in his story that address the question of faith versus the material world,” she said. “He presents this false dichotomy. People tend to believe that faith is in one camp and science and rational thought are in another. Then, Father Brown’s character sets about destroying that idea.”

Nichols said many conversations took place between herself, the actors, and others at afO to ensure these ideas were presented in a clear and compelling way. 

“It’s a two-act play that the playwright has divided into chapters,” she said. “There’s three chapters in each act, plus a prologue and an epilogue.” 

Nichols said the pace and structure of the play had a great deal of influence on staging. 

“Another unique aspect of this play is that we’re staging it alley style,” Nichols said. “This means that the audience will sit on two sides facing in.”

Nichols said the alley-style seating will allow there to be three different locations simultaneously. 

She said action can be going on at either end of the “alley,” or in the center of the stage, at any given time. 

Additionally, projections will be used as backdrops to indicate the location of the characters.

Off the Book

Despite some challenges, Nichols believes her team is ready to go.

“We’re practicing three nights a week,” she said. “We’re about three weeks into the rehearsal process and many of the actors are already rehearsing off-book.” 

Being “off-book” means the actors have fully memorized their lines and are no longer reading from the script. 

Nichols said that, because this is such an active show and requires a lot of movement, the actors wanted to get off-book as soon as possible.

Along with preparation, Nichols explained part of the reason actors wanted to get off-book is because this script is in the form of three-ring binder.

“Patrick Rieger wrote this play as a college project,” Nichols said. “He published it, but it’s not a play that is being handled through a licensing company. 

“So, after I read it, I contacted the email address in the book, which was the West Coast Company that had premiered it, and they gave me Rieger’s email.

“He was very generous, he said that he was just thrilled somebody wants to produce his play. He said that he had written it when he was young and that we were free to make any adjustments we needed to the script.” 

Nichols said she and the actors have made a few adjustments but are grateful to be working with the solid foundation of the play Rieger wrote. 

Wrapping Up

Audience members looking for an intriguing and uplifting way to spend an afternoon or evening should look no further than afO’s Father Brown.

“It is a very PG-rated set of murder-mysteries that are a little bit more ghoulish than usual,” Nichols said. “There’s also a good deal of humor in it, as well as a love story. So, it really has a little bit of everything.”

At least once a season, afO likes to find an appropriate local charity their audience can support. Since this show features a Catholic priest, afO will be partnering with Catholic Charities. 

Audience members are encouraged to help CC and the many pregnant moms they support by bringing donations of disposable diapers, wipes, powder, pacifiers, or other baby supplies to the performance they attend.