CTC tours “Seedfolks” to New York, Nebraska and Greater Minnesota

Published in

Off Book

4 min readJan 16, 2018

Sonja Parks in “Seedfolks” | Photo by Dan Norman

Children’s Theatre Company (CTC) will bring its production of Seedfolks on a three-month tour to eight cities across Minnesota, Omaha (The Rose Theater) and Lincoln (Lied Center for Performing Arts), Nebraska and to The New Victory Theater, New York. The organization received significant tour support from the Minnesota State Arts Board’s Arts Tour Minnesota grant to bring Seedfolks to nine theatres across Minnesota including the Memorial Auditorium Performing Arts Center (Worthington), Myles Reif Performing Arts Center (Grand Rapids), Fairmont Opera House (Fairmont), Historic Holmes Theatre (Detroit Lakes), Sheldon Theatre of Performing Arts (Red Wing), Backus Community Center (International Falls), Central Lakes Community Performing Arts Center (Brainerd) and Memorial Auditorium (Dawson) in the spring of 2018 (full performance schedule below). The ninth supported site was Theatre L’Homme Dieu in Alexandria in summer 2017. CTC recently brought this production of Seedfolks to the prestigious ASSITEJ International (International Association of Theatre for Children and Young People) 2017 World Conference in Cape Town, South Africa.

The CTC commissioned play was developed and premiered at CTC in 2014 and is based on the book by Newbery Award-winning author Paul Fleischman. Seedfolks begins when nine-year-old Kim plants the first seeds in the rat-infested, vacant lot next to her apartment building. They are six lima bean seeds, planted in honor of the father she never knew. Slowly, each member of the community finds a reason to plant their own seeds, resurrecting a derelict lot and uniting a fractured neighborhood. Actress Sonja Parks embodies the 11 distinct voices of Gibb Street in this enthralling, one-woman production.

“This is a beautifully written, funny and poignant book and production about the power we all have to be catalysts for change,” states CTC Artistic Director and Seedfolks Director, Peter C. Brosius. “We came to the decision to use one single actor to portray 11, diverse voices in this production as a demonstration that we are all part of a whole, and together, we can create something beautiful.”

This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.