Stations of the Doublecross
Shereen Salem as Cat's Roommate and Mitchel Ahern as Wolfe. Wolfe is singing "When You're Dead Where Does Your Information Go?"
On June 22, 2024, Fort Point Theatre Channel and P-town, Inc. presented Stations of the Doublecross, a one-act musical revue on themes of seeking and betrayal.
The betrayals in Stations of the Doublecross are variations on the bait-and-switch that promises the pursuit and possibility of happiness but instead imposes neoliberal monetized precarity and authoritarianism. Two opposed characters known as Cat (The Seeker) and Wolfe (The Mouth), along with players representing other allies and antagonists, explore what's at stake here with songs, signs, motion, and dialogue.
Mitchel Ahern as Wolfe confronts the band (Larry Plitt on guitar, Nick Thorkelson on keys).
Mitchel Ahern, Rick Dorff, and Nick Thorkelson wrote, designed, and produced the show. Performers were Ahern, Dorff, Letta Neely, Larry Plitt, Shereen Salem, and Thorkelson. Ahern, Dorff, Neely, and Thorkelson are all multidisciplinary artists and FPTC Artistic Co-Directors. Salem is a dancer/choreographer. Guitarist Larry Plitt leads The Squeezebox Stompers. All have performed in and helped create earlier FPTC shows in Provincetown and elsewhere.
Shereen Salem as Cat's Roommate, disappointed by an empty coffin during the "Grave Robbery" number.
Stations of the Doublecross featured songs by Ahern and Thorkelson: “Fifty Bullets,” “The Seeker,” “Have We Been Had,” “When You're Dead Where Does Your Information Go,” “Grave Robbery,” and “The Billionaires Took All the Money.”
Letta Neely as Cat, Shereen Salem as Cat's Roommate, and Mitchel Ahern as Wolfe, performing "The Seeker."
Our sponsoring venue was P-town, Inc. (long name: P-town, Inc., formerly “Provincetown, you’ll swear you were really there”). P-town, Inc. is an historic theme park created by Jay Critchley in Provincetown in 1997 for the affluent and those who love them. This destination attraction includes the Septic Theater in the Ground, the Re-Rooters Resort Grotto, an outhouse sculpture installation, the 1984 Sand Car, and the latest, the iZONE, and more. For more info: jaycritchley.com.
FPTC has now presented four shows in Provincetown, the first three at Debbie Nadolney's AMP Gallery: Threw the Keyhole, Serf's Up, and The Spirits Teach Us How to Build the Union Family Sewing Machine. The AMP Gallery closed in 2022 due to a rent hike (it has remained vacant since then, and that’s what we’re talking about). But Provincetown impresario Jay Critchley offered his back yard, a.k.a. "FPTC-Inc.," in Provincetown’s West End, as a site for FPTC to perform in again. The yard has a terrace for the audience surrounded by four structures—an outhouse, shed, portapotty, and grotto—that inspired the theme and title, along with a septic tank that played the part of a looted gravesite. Early Stations of the Doublecross, a workshop to develop this show, was presented and warmly received at the Atlantic Works Gallery in East Boston on March 23.
Letta Neely as Cat and Mitchel Ahern as Wolfe. Wolfe is singing "Fifty Bullets in Your Hat."
There were supposed to be two June 22 performances of Stations of the Doublecross, at 3:00 and 7:00, but the evening show got rained out. We hope to present a more fully developed version of Stations of the Doublecross in Boston in the Spring of 2025.