BEMIDJI — The Paul Bunyan Playhouse team has faced no shortage of challenges in recent years, but is putting it all behind them as they kick off their summer season with a performance all about new beginnings.
“Songs for a New World” opens at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, June 4, at the Historic Chief Theater in downtown Bemidji. Shows continue at 7:30 p.m. June 5-7 and 11-13, with a 2 p.m. matinee on Wednesday, June 10.
“Songs for a New World” is a work of musical theater written and composed by Tony Award-winner Jason Robert Brown. The play was his first produced show, originally performed Off-Broadway at the WPA Theatre in 1995.
“It’s about one moment. It’s about hitting the wall and having to make a choice: take a stand or turn around and go back,” he’s famously said of the show.
Brown and director Daisy Prince put together songs he had written for other venues and events, resulting in “neither musical play nor revue, it is closer to a theatrical song cycle, a very theatrical song cycle,” the Playhouse noted in its synopsis.
“It’s just a beautiful story with beautiful music,” Paul Bunyan Playhouse Director Philip Hoks described. “It’s these big voices coming together to blend, and so it’s not like a chorus blending, it’s individual voices coming to be in harmony, and so that’s what’s really unique about this show.”
Annalise Braught / Bemidji Pioneer
The Playhouse, which began in 1951, is the oldest professional summer stock company in Minnesota and draws actors from across the country.
“Songs for a New World” features four characters — played by actors Raheem Fielder, Madison Alexander, Tyler Gregory Kelly and Nicole Korbisch — who span various eras and backgrounds but all find themselves navigating a new set of circumstances.
“Audiences can expect some incredible music coming at them while experiencing the feeling of going into a nightclub and seeing them performing a show that’s being put together,” Hoks explained. “It’s more of these loose numbers, and then they’re weaving a story between them, so it’s like going to a live nightclub.”
Annalise Braught / Bemidji Pioneer
The show explores themes of hope, fear, love, the struggle for identity, and the resilience required to keep moving forward — much like the theater and team behind it have in recent months.
After
to three shows and
2025’s being canceled altogether
due to financial constraints, the Playhouse was excited to be
back with five shows this summer.
But then, just weeks before the season was set to begin, the Playhouse — which also operates the Chief Theater — was facing the reality of not having housing for its summer cast members.
The board shared on May 20 that as preparations began for the 2026 season, they contacted Bemidji State University to secure actor housing — something that has traditionally been part of their annual process.
During those discussions, the board was informed of unpaid housing balances from 2023 and 2024 totaling nearly $14,000, mere weeks before actors were set to arrive for the upcoming season.
Annalise Braught / Bemidji Pioneer
“After many conversations and negotiations, we are grateful that the university has agreed to allow housing to move forward if we can immediately provide a $5,000 payment and enter into arrangements for the remaining balance,” the board said.
Thanks to the swift response from the community
the immediate need was met to allow the summer season to continue as planned.
“We got what we needed for the immediate, but we’re still going to be starting to work on our big capital needs,” Hoks explained. “We still need a new roof, we still need our bathrooms replaced.”
He noted that while the Playhouse has been utilizing the theater, some repairs have been made, while other things have been short-term fixes that now need to be completely redone or require bigger projects in order for the building to remain usable.
“We’ve been in here almost 30 years, so some things can’t just be a repair anymore; we’re to the point where it needs to be an overhaul,” he added. “We’re going to need new seats; we’re starting to see the wear and tear on our stage, so the stage floor will have to be replaced. Some of those things are big needs, so we’re talking major renovations.”
Annalise Braught / Bemidji Pioneer
Over the next few weeks, he said that the board has plans to release what a lot of those bigger projects are going to look like.
“We might not have all of the financials until close to the end of summer,” he added. “But we’ll be releasing what we’re looking at trying to do over the course of the next three to five years.”
Hoks said the recent donations were a huge boost as they prepare to kick off the season, but now it’s up to the community to purchase tickets and attend the shows to ensure things go off without a hitch.
“I’m excited,” Hoks said of the first show’s opening. “I just want people to start buying tickets so that we have people come in, because this place is absolutely wonderful, and supporting the arts in northern Minnesota is so important.”
Annalise Braught / Bemidji Pioneer
Tickets can be purchased by selecting “2026 Season Tickets” at
Anyone who wishes to support the Playhouse can do so at
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.bemidjipioneer.com ’
