Walking around Ascension Community Theatre’s building during rehearsal night, actors are practicing their lines wherever possible.
They linger beneath the marquee, outside by the little red door or in the greenroom behind the stage.
It’s late January, and ACT is a couple weeks out from the mid-February debut of its season opener, Arsenic and Old Lace. Scenes are being run onstage with the seriousness of opening night.
This season, after all, is a big one. The nonprofit, volunteer-run theater troupe is celebrating its 25th anniversary. It’s marking a quarter-century by staging six favorite shows from its past.
“It’s kind of like our revival season,” says Dustin Delaune, president of ACT’s board of directors.
Before this year, ACT had only repeated a show once: The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, which ran in December 2000 and again in December 2021.
For the rest of the season, the group is looking forward to also revisiting Cabaret, Annie, Steel Magnolias, A Streetcar Named Desire and Miracle on 34th Street. And if reception is strong, ACT may add old productions into the mix every now and then.
“We’re hoping to continue doing new things,” Delaune says, “but also keeping a bit of our history thrown in every so often.”
The theater’s Gonzales home is inside a 1930s building on Felicity Avenue, not far from the New River. It screened movies as the Pasqua Theatre until the ’80s.
“It’s always been the home of art,” Delaune says.
ACT moved into the space in 1999 and officially bought the building in 2003. Renovations in 2017 and 2018 added a backstage and converted an old balcony into a tech booth and storage for costumes and props. Now, it boasts both a greenroom for the actors to relax offstage and a workroom where sets are built from wood and other materials.
Construction uncovered treasures like an old roll of movie tickets—listed at 32 cents each.
“I get to give out special tickets every once in a while to certain people,” Delaune says.
“It’s just a place where we encourage as many people from all different walks of life to come and be a part of.”
[—Dustin Delaune, president of ACT’s board of directors]
Today, ACT tries to reach as diverse an audience as possible, ensuring that each season has at least one comedy, one drama and one musical. When it comes to selecting shows, audience appeal is considered—and also how much a storyline will satisfy the artistic flames of the cast and crew.
“We’re a home away from home for everybody. You don’t have to necessarily want to be onstage. You can come and help paint, you can come and help pull costumes,” Delaune says. “It’s just a place where we encourage as many people from all different walks of life to come and be a part of.”
SEE THE SHOWS
• Cabaret: April 24-May 4
• Annie: July 10-27
• Steel Magnolias: Sept. 4-14
• A Streetcar Named Desire: Oct. 16-26
• Miracle on 34th Street: Dec. 11-21
Find tickets and info at actgonzales.org.
This article was originally published in the April 2025 issue of 225 Magazine.
