Shockheaded Peter is a “nasty picture book” of a musical, loosely based on German children’s book Struwelpeter, written by Heinrich Hoffman. The macabre and sinister production uses musical versions of the book’s poems to spin stories of naughty children and misguided parents. The show is set in a distorted Victorian toy theater and evokes a lost world of theatrical illusions including a music box spinning out of control and an advent calendar with a horrifying surprise behind every door.

Richie Call, assistant professor in the Department of Theatre Arts in the Caine College of the Arts and director of the show, said that German pediatrician Heinrich Hoffman was looking for an interesting book to buy for his son and couldn’t find anything so he wrote and illustrated Shockheaded Peter himself. Call said the book has some dark aspects to it to illustrate morals and lessons to children.

“Shockheaded Peter is no more about child abuse or killing of children than Harry Potter is about child abuse and the scarring of children,” Call said. “It is a component of the story, but the story itself is trying to teach something other than that. What we’re doing with this show isn’t the same thing the book was trying to do; we’re trying to entertain.”

As a father, Call wonders about things we tell our kids to scare them into behaving and if it’s okay to lie to them if the outcome is for their benefit. He says he’s not sure about the answer but he thinks the question is what’s really important.

The style of Shockheaded Peter is meant to be very theatrical. Call explained that having a narrator for the show is meant to break what is referred to as “the fourth wall,” a performance convention in which an invisible, imagined wall separates actors from the audience.

“There’s actors playing characters playing characters, with an element of puppets,” Call said. “It’s an automatic reminder to the audience that they’re watching a play, but sometimes it pulls you into the moment even more and you can just soak in the story.”

Call hopes Shockheaded Peter is different than anything audiences have ever seen, in a good way.

Cast includes: Blake Brundy (Emcee); Liza Shoell (Mother); Noah Gentry (Father); Addie Provost (Vondel); Porter Lance (Probe); Rachel Saltmarsh (Sitz); Jake Hansen (Hanz); Abigail Smith (Hildagard); James M. Johnson (Gunter); Hanna Speer (Gerda); Bryson LaBar (Wolfgang); Madeline Liddell (Irmengard); Trent Dahlin (Otto); Shane Wegner (Heinrich) and Timo Rasmussen (Helmut).

Tickets for Shockheaded Peter are $18 adults, $15 seniors/youth, $10 USU faculty/staff and free for USU students with ID. The show contains images that may be disturbing to some audience members. Viewer discretion is advised. No puppets were harmed during the creation of this production. For more information or tickets, contact the CCA Box Office in room L101 of the Chase Fine Arts Center on USU’s campus, call 435-797-8022, or go online to cca.usu.edu.

After a severe incident of spousal abuse, two families’ lives are altered until the final collision point at an isolated cabin. The families are linked by the marriage of their children, Jake and Beth. Beth is recuperating at her parents’ home after Jake’s abuse sends her to the hospital. A Lie of the Mind explores the families’ dysfunction and love as they deal with Beth’s brain damage and follows Jake on his search for meaning in his life.

“Sam Shepard is one of the most significant 20th century playwrights,” Adrianne Moore, head of the Department of Theatre Arts in the Caine College of the Arts and director of the show, said. “We’re doing this as a celebration of all of his incredibly wonderful writing.”

Moore said the show is a raw and gritty play, but without on-stage violence. A Lie of the Mind is a show teenagers and adults will enjoy.

One of the difficult aspects for actors in the show is discovering anger in themselves and investigating the emotional aspects of being a violent person.

“You can abhor the crime and still find the character who is the perpetrator interesting,” Moore said. “It would be easy for us to dismiss the perpetrator as only a ‘bad guy,’ but he’s also a multifaceted character that the audience needs to meet.”

The relationship between Jake and Beth is complicated, Moore says.

“They have an intense yearning for each other,” Moore said. “Part of you wants Beth to get rid of Jake, but it’s not as straightforward as that. He is filled with an intense sorrow and seems to be only a shell of a person without Beth in his life.”

People aren’t behaving in ways that we normally view as politically correct or in ways that are good for them either. It’s painful to see Beth yearn for Jake even after what she has been through.

Audiences are used to seeing parent/child relationships and romantic relationships in theatre and film where things fall apart, but sibling relationships are typically not focused on as much.

“In A Lie of the Mind, the sibling relationships are quite fraught, but also close, detailed, adult relationships,” Moore said.

A Lie of the Mind is often called one of Shepard’s most important plays.

“It’s beautifully written,” Moore said. “It’s not super light, but it’s the intricacies of the way we relate to the people we’ve grown up with and know incredibly well. There’s no strangers in this show.”

Cast includes: Mollee Barse (Beth); Anna Bodily (Sally); Tyler Campbell (Baylor); Cameron Eastland (Jake); Rachael Hodge (Lorraine); Stacey Shorthill (Meg); Hayden Sproul (Mike) and Alex Smith (Frankie).

Tickets for A Lie of the Mind are $13 adults, $10 seniors/youth, $8 USU faculty/staff and free for USU students with ID. For more information or tickets, contact the CCA Box Office in room L101 of the Chase Fine Arts Center on USU’s campus, call 435-797-8022, or go online to cca.usu.edu.

The play, by Lisa Peterson and Denis O’Hare, combines poetry, humor, the tale of the Trojan War and the modern world for a captivating show that grapples with humankind’s perpetual capacity for violence while exploring the beauty and profound human connection found in the midst of war. It is set in the present moment with a poet on stage throughout the show, played by actress and temporary Caine College of the Arts (CCA) instructor Tarah Flanagan and produced by Jason Spelbring, CCA professor.

“It’s a piece that is really close to my heart,” Flanagan, who first performed the one-woman show at the Great River Shakespeare Festival, said. “I’ve seen Jason’s work as a director and actor and feel like I’m in really good hands bringing the performance to USU.”

Spelbring said he and Flanagan are bringing in 16-year-old Eva Scholz-Carlson as the muse.

“She wrote original music that accompanies the story, so I thought it was really important to bring her in for this performance,” Spelbring said. “She’s a prodigy on the cello and absolutely angelic. Her music is stunning and it’s all original composition.”

Spelbring and Flanagan both marvel about how a story written thousands of years ago can still resonate so well today.

“We are used to hearing most war stories told from a male perspective,” Flanagan said. “I think it resonates in a different way to hear us grapple with our propensity for rage and violence and how the cycles are repeated over and over again filtered through a female voice. It’s interesting as a female performer to be asked to tap into that side of my own humanity and to have a vehicle to allow for the entirety of it and not just the pretty, gentle, passive parts.”

Flanagan said it is very exciting to have the show fully produced, including lighting, here at USU.

“I get to benefit from the artists who are already here,” Flanagan said. “To be in a room with Spelbring, lighting director, Bruce Duerden, and stage manager, LuAnn Baker, and bounce ideas off each other of the vision of the show is an exciting opportunity as an actor and not one I anticipated having with this show.”

This is neither a pro or anti-war piece, Flanagan said.

“An Iliad busts open all pre-conceived notions about war,” Flanagan said. “There are bonds and friendship so deep and sacred amidst war, appreciation for life and love amidst war, and also heroism and rage. Everything about humanity is explored to some extent in this show and I find it incredibly humbling.”

An Iliad contains depictions of violence and strong language. Children under 6 years of age, including babes in arms, will not be admitted. Children 6 and older should attend at parent’s discretion. There will be a talk back question and answer segment immediately following Friday night’s performance. Tickets for An Iliad are $13 adults, $10 seniors/youth, $8 USU faculty/staff and free for USU students with ID. For more information or tickets, contact the CCA Box Office in room L101 of the Chase Fine Arts Center on USU’s campus, call 435-797-8022, or go online to cca.usu.edu.