A couple of months ago, the Defiance Community Players, a local nonprofit theater group based in Glenwood Springs, teased a few new upcoming projects, with a radio play being the main yet-to-be-unveiled attraction.
“We’re working on one right now and we want it to be a surprise,” Travis Dean Wilson, president of the Defiance Community Players, told the Post Independent in June.
However, Defiance has decided it is time to unveil this surprise, as Wilson has opened up to The Sopris Sun to give the people of the Valley a bit more information.
“The goal is to do a retelling of ‘War of the Worlds’ by Orson Welles for the Halloween season. Part of that goal is to have it recorded live from the Glenwood airport to give it more of an authentic feel of being in an era where they’re having plane activity and warcraft.”
This production is one step in a plan to “revive” the company after the major hit it took thanks to COVID-19. The Players’ business model is based on community engagement and real world connections, which was rather difficult to accomplish during a worldwide pandemic. However, this new plan promises a return to form.
“We’re starting with smaller projects,” said Wilson, “and the goal is to hopefully get back to what we used to do in a couple of years: big musical productions that had the entire community involved.”
Wilson continued to speak on the importance of community engagement in his vision of true “community theater,” claiming that he wants to see the entire community “whether they were on the stage, behind the scenes or just helping raise money and spreading the word of the show.”
To anyone who wants to make this vision a reality, Wilson leaves the following message: “Keep an eye out. Be supportive, come and see us or listen in whenever we do have events. And just that notion of, if you want to be a part of the village, you got to be a villager. So if you want to see the community theater scene come to life, you have to be a part of it. We need all the help we can take. It can’t be done by just a small group of people. It takes a community.”
To reach out to the Defiance Community Players, email (defianceplayers@gmail.com) or call 970-251-0462.