Theatre is Served

Great theatre is often a matter of taste. And in the case of one storied area organization, the words take on a whole other meaning. Olde Towne Dinner Theatre has made its bread and butter on, well… bread and butter — and the full night-out experience is what it’s been serving up for 40-plus years in Worthing, S.D.

(From left) Jessica Ashton, Mo Plastow & Erin Sharp perform Fox on the Fairway at Olde Towne Dinner Theatre in Worthing, S.D., in fall 2023.

“It was just a farming community in Worthing who wanted to start putting on plays,” described John Boe, longtime company artistic director and frequent production director. “They rented out what’s now our front lobby where the bar is. They built a little stage and they put on plays for 10 to 20 people, starting out with hot dogs and burgers and stuff like that.”

In the early years of the space, there was a passage directly into the bar next door, where patrons would order and pick up drinks and come back into the theater for the show. Eventually, the owner of the building donated the space to Olde Towne, where the theater space is located now and was previously a garage for vehicle repairs.

“It was a furniture store before it was the theater. A guy worked on cars in the back and it was on a dirt road. Looked like an old west town, with our building standing there.”

The facility’s current kitchen, in fact, was originally a grocery store that has since been converted. This acquisition marked a new era for the organization, when in-house, multi-course meals became part of the experience.

“We’ve grown to do a four-course meal now, and the food’s always fantastic,” said Boe, who first joined Olde Towne nearly 20 years ago in 2005. The company has grown its subscriber base through the past two decades to around 700 per season, putting on anywhere from 18-20 performances of a given production to accommodate the demand for attendance. This growth has also affected turnout for talent interested in being a part of Olde Towne’s productions.

“When I first started, we had a very small core group of regular actors and then a few people would come in for auditions for one particular show and maybe that's the last time we'd see them,” Boe said. “Since then, our regulars have definitely grown. And that's the nice thing about this theatre community. The Sioux Falls community has grown so much just since 2005 — at that time it was just the Sioux Empire Community Theatre, us and Mighty Corson Art Players, and so many great companies have popped up since then that I think it's just attracted more and more people in.”

Return talent has also been a hallmark of Boe’s tenure at Olde Towne, where the totally unique experience of participating in a dinner-theatre production has drawn folks back for future shows.

“It feels like a family atmosphere,” he said. “That's what I fell in love with and that's why I've been here for so long. Everyone truly cares about each other. And from the artistic standpoint, we do a lot of real feel-good shows. I am a big fan of escapist theatre. It's nice for people to get away and just put their problems behind and laugh for two hours. And we like to do a lot of that.

“Occasionally we try to slot something in that might be a little more of a thinker, a little more of a dramatic comedy. We kind of shy away from hard drama for the most part. But it's just a joy.”

Beyond serving as the company’s artistic director, Boe finds himself in the director’s chair frequently at the Worthing theater, a position that’s brought him exponential fulfilment as the years go by.

“I enjoy directing a good comedy, and I feel like it's one of my strengths,” he said. “When a joke just gets delivered perfectly and lands perfectly, it's just such a joy. One of my favorite things during a show here is to sit out in the lobby and hear that booming laughter — that's one of my favorite parts.”

Operating in a small bedroom community beyond the city limits of Sioux Falls, Olde Towne has a captive audience in the local community, but has also been able to draw frequent visitors from Sioux Falls and the surrounding area, descending on the under-1,000 town for dinner and a show.

“I love the small-town atmosphere, and the community is very supportive,” Boe said. “They love talking about the theater. So many nights the show will start and I'll be headed over to the gas station for something and I'll run into one of the bartenders from next door, or they'll be talking to the person at the gas station saying, ‘Oh yeah, I volunteered the other night’ or ‘We got tickets the other night and it was so good.’

“And it's nice that it's a contained night. You get your dinner and your show and you just have to drive to one place. And that I think works out really well for being in Worthing versus Sioux Falls, because there aren’t as many restaurants in close proximity. So the fact that you can just come here for everything and that's your night, I think works out really well.”

But purchasing your ticket isn’t the only to get the Olde Towne experience — an organization that has relied on the support of a network of volunteers, community members and those looking to lend a hand can sign up to be a server or busser and see the show on the house.

“At any job, you can have people who are there for a paycheck and they're just going to do their job. But these volunteers… there are so many who will serve six to eight nights during the run of a show because they know we need help and they like it down there,” Boe said. “It’s an amazing thing, because it's someone who's got that same passion that I feel for my job. They know how important they are to us and they're going to come through for us.”

With two more productions to wrap in their current season and a recently announced 42nd season on the horizon, Boe is hopeful that the company’s continuous growth will be evident in the years to come, as Olde Towne Dinner Theatre approaches its 50th birthday.

“I’d like to see us be able to expand a little bit,” he said. “We're going to need a new building one day — this building's a hundred years older than the organization. We've had a number of people over the years say, ‘Oh, don't get a new building. We love this place.’ I love the atmosphere as well. But eventually it’d be nice to have the wing space, maybe have a fly system so we can more easily do some shows we've shied away from because we just don't have the facility for it.

“As the years go by, Sioux Falls keeps getting closer and closer to Worthing — it’s practically a suburb now. And as that expansion happens, I think we will get even more people through the door. If we can fit it on our little stage to do bigger-cast shows, I’m less worried about filling out casts than in years prior. We have so many more people coming down to audition, so I’m excited for what’s to come.”