The Long Beach Shakespeare Company (LBSC) is celebrating its 20th anniversary at its Bixby Knolls location with a “homecoming” themed season.
Although the company began under the moniker “Bard in the Yard” in 1990, it has gone through a number of name and location changes during its time in Long Beach. A rich history led by former creative director Helen Borgers has created a sense of community for the actors, directors and crew who call Long Beach home.
“It really is the community that it’s created, the groups of friends and everything,” said Brando Cutts, creative director for the LBSC. “I’ve been to three weddings from people who met at the Shakespeare company doing plays together. And some of my—actually all of my closest friends are from the Shakespeare Company.”
The homecoming sentiment rang especially true for Cutts, who has been with the LBSC since he was 16 years old. In 2000, Cutts was a junior at Cabrillo High School and, like his peers, was looking for a way to kill time after school.
“It was still a new school. Like there weren’t any programs out there … there was no drama program or any type of program,” Cutts said. “And so some students wanted to start a drama club, but without a drama teacher.”
A teacher from the English department connected the students with Borgers, who at the time was producing plays in parks throughout Long Beach. Borgers immediately took the group under her wing, and within a year the high schoolers were putting on shows like “Romeo and Juliet” among others to unsuspecting crowds.
She also took Cutts under her wing artistically, introducing him to “weird” books, movies and plays that piqued his interest at the time. He began thinking of Borgers as a parental figure, he said, and the company as a home, long before they had a permanent location.
Cutts is one of the few members of the company who has been there since before the location on Atlantic Avenue became The Black Box Theatre, then later The Helen Borgers Theatre. He is the mind behind the current homecoming themed season, which is nearly halfway through its run with its current production of “Peer Gynt.”
Cutts can recall the days when rehearsals were performed in a garage on Anaheim Street and productions happened only after the small group of drama enthusiasts set up their two-level Elizabethan stage each day at various Long Beach parks —a stage Cutts helped build himself.
It was under the direction of Borgers, and through the dedication of Cutts and the rest of the company at the time, that the LBSC matured enough for a more permanent location in 2001.
Current president Chris Garcia and Borgers were critical in landing the space for The Black Box Theatre in Bixby Knolls, while Cutts’ job was a bit more hands-on.
“So I was there to help with the move for sure,” Cutts said. “There were all these boats and boating equipment in there and so it was a lot of cleanup. And there was actually, strangely enough, like a bullet in the back wall. So we had to fix the back wall and get rid of all these boats and all this oil that was all over the floor. And so that’s where I came in during that process.”
The dozen or so actors that were part of the company at the time spent a year to get the theater into working condition—a term used loosely, as technical features such as the air conditioning and light grid were not fully functioning.
“We started off calling ourselves the Long Beach Shakespeare Company’s Black Box Theatre, but we would all joke that it was the ‘sweat box theater’ because there was no air conditioning and it was really hot in there,” Cutts said. “We did have a light grid in at that time. And so we actually had box fans on the light grid. Between each scene we would turn on the fans for a second, cool down the space and then turn it off again. It was so noisy.”
The can-do attitude and his connection to the group of actors was enough to keep Cutts coming back, even after a year-long stint in New York where he performed classic Shakespeare stories in public libraries. When he made the decision to return to Long Beach, Borgers called him and said she needed Cutts to play Hamlet, and he hasn’t looked back since.
“We started off calling ourselves the Long Beach Shakespeare Company’s Black Box Theatre, but we would all joke that it was the ‘sweat box theater’ because there was no air conditioning and it was really hot in there.”
—Brando Cutts, creative director for the LBSC
His return resulted in a more prominent role than before, filling in as needed by directing shows in Borgers’ place “here and there” and assisting with lighting design. When Borgers became ill in 2007, Cutts felt compelled to step in for the woman who influenced so much of his life.
“When she got sick, it was like my mom got sick, and even more than my mom,” Cutts said. “I was very close to Helen and so when she got sick and was in the hospital, I of course took over all of her responsibilities at the theater. And when I would visit her in the hospital, I would assure her that Shakespeare Company is taken care of.”
When asked why he’s chosen to stay with the LBSC for so long, the answer is summed up into one word: family.
“I do have a love of theater, but when it came to this place, it was about family,” Cutts said. “It superseded any love of theater. It was about taking care of a family business, a family tradition.”
Even for those who didn’t grow up within the company, the affection and support from the community is undeniable. Even during the pandemic, the company found new ways to survive through grants from the city, donations from longtime patrons, and the unyielding dedication of the troupe itself.
“A lot of theaters closed over COVID, but we managed to hang in there and I attribute that to really wonderful patrons,” said Dana Leach, LBSC theater manager. “We have the community support, we have a community that really lifts us up and takes care of us. And hopefully we’re doing the same thing for them.”
Janice Wong, longtime patron of the LBSC says the feeling of camaraderie and support is exactly why she still attends every show, nearly 20 years after Borgers introduced her to the company. Wong has also contributed to this environment, as she has brought countless friends, family members and students whom she mentors for plays at the Helen Borgers Theatre.
From her favorite seat, front row, stage right, she has watched actors grow up on stage, playing the “children” roles of productions, then eventually taking on larger and larger parts in the play.
The theater is run completely through donations and ticket sales, Leach explained. The actors who don classic costumes and recite passages in old English by night also have day jobs to manage. As a result, many of the actors who perform at the Helen Borgers Theater eventually leave for other theaters and companies, but they are almost always likely to return home for a production or two.
The LBSC is currently showing “Peer Gynt,” a play about a man who leaves his home which he takes for granted, to find a harsh and cruel world has changed him before finally returning. A full synopsis of the show along with tickets are available for purchase at the company’s website.
The theater is located at 4250 Atlantic Ave. with productions running Fridays through Sundays.