WHITE RIVER JUNCTION — In the past, We the People Theatre’s founder Perry Allison hasn’t shied away from musicals with a lot of energy.

Last year’s annual production, “Something Rotten,” for instance, was a light-hearted romp about two 16th-century playwrights forced to compete with Shakespeare himself.

“A Man of No Importance,” this year’s pick, which opens on Friday at the Briggs Opera House, is also about theater. The tone is weightier this time, but the story is ultimately an uplifting one about the redemptive power of friendship, especially in hostile times.

Like all of We the People’s shows, “A Man of No Importance” is a response to the present moment. “In terms of relevance for the time we’re in, it’s a story about acceptance,” Allison said.

Set against the oppressive backdrop of 1964 Dublin, the show charts bus driver Alfie Byrne’s dogged efforts to direct his amateur theater troupe in Oscar Wilde’s “Salome,” despite objections from the church where the group rehearses.

Byrne is also wrestling with a secret, one that, in Catholic Dublin, puts his safety at risk. As the play unfolds, that secret comes to the fore, jeopardizing his place in his community.

The production welcomes past players at We the People, including Richard Waterhouse, who directed “Something Rotten.” Waterhouse is still directing, only this time it’s as Byrne, and the only actors he needs to worry about are the ones in the fictional troupe.

Since moving to Vermont 18 years ago, Waterhouse has become a mainstay of Upper Valley theater, and many of his fellow cast members in “A Man of No Importance” are people he’s directed in past productions.

“To be on stage together for the first time, we’re all kind of giddy,” he said.

Waterhouse holds a bachelor’s degree in musical theater, but his passion for singing has taken a back seat over the years. Now, he’s excited to return to his “first love in theater.”

“It very much feels like some kind of destiny, like it was something I was supposed to do,” he said.

Like Waterhouse, “A Man of No Importance,” marks a kind of return for director Eric Love, who first acted in the play 10 years ago in Brooklyn.

“It’s a very powerful story and a very intimate cast and one of those plays that really sticks with you,” Love said. Now living in Manhattan, Love spent six years as Northern Stage’s director of education until 2022.

Written by American composer Stephen Flaherty, the show’s score has the ambling, homespun quality of folk music, with lots of Irish flute interwoven throughout. Unlike the flashy numbers that decorate most musicals, these simpler songs “put a bigger emphasis on people’s personalities,” Love said. “We want to see the rough edges of these people.”

In past productions, characters have played their own instruments, but We the People’s version takes inspiration from the 2002 premier at Lincoln Center, which featured a live band. Musicians will join actors on the Briggs’ stage in the upcoming show. 

“We really want that acoustic quality to be visible to the audience so they see and feel the band as part of the show,” Love said.

Directing such an unconventional musical was new to Love, but the play’s meta quality intrigued him.

“I love theater that is about theater, the sort of play within a play convention, because almost nothing can express theater as well as theater itself,” he said.

Theater is the medium through which the play’s characters understand themselves; it’s also what ties them together despite a host of obstacles, including their own biases. It’s a hopeful message, one that’s not lost on its players.

“In these challenging times right now it’s like ‘why theater?’ and I think that this play gives a great answer,” Love said.

“A Man of No Importance” runs from Friday, March 28 through Sunday, April 13 at the Briggs Opera House in White River Junction. For tickets ($15-$38) or more information, visit wethepeopletheatre.com or call 802-478-0243.

Documentary filmmakers at Dartmouth

If “A Man of No Importance” is an homage to theater and the people who care about it, “The Ride Ahead,” a documentary coming to DHMC this Friday, has something similar to say about the power of film.

A collaboration between father-and-son filmmakers Dan and Samuel Habib, the film explores the challenges of transitioning to adult life for people with a disability. It’s a personal subject for 25-year-old Samuel, who lives with cerebral palsy.

The Concord native came up with the idea for the film six years ago, when life after high school left him uncertain of the path ahead.

“I wanted to go to college. Date. Get a job. Live on my own. But no one tells you how to be an adult, let alone an adult with a disability,” Samuel said.

In search of answers, he pitched an idea to his dad, a filmmaker and former photojournalist at the Concord Monitor. The pair would travel across the country interviewing artists, activists and athletes about how they navigate life with a disability.

What started as a sizzle reel was soon picked up by The New York Times, who helped the pair develop the project into a documentary short called “My Disability Roadmap,” which won an Emmy award in 2023.

“The Road Ahead,” is an expanded, feature-length version of that project. Its subjects, which include disability rights pioneer Judy Heumann, come from a host of backgrounds.

“Right from the beginning, we wanted to represent America,” Dan said. “We wanted it to represent a swatch of cultures and disabilities and identities…So it didn’t just feel like a white man’s story.”

Dan’s years as a filmmaker made him well-versed in fundraising and putting a crew together, but Samuel had creative reign from the beginning. Two GoPro cameras were attached to Samuel’s wheelchair, and he and Dan logged hours programming interview questions into his communication device so that he could conduct interviews himself.

Putting Samuel at the center of the story affected what the documentary was able to capture about the lives of its subjects. Heumann, for example, felt more comfortable sharing parts of her life with an interviewer who was disabled.

The majority of the film’s crew were also disabled, which Dan hopes will act as a model for other filmmakers.

“Whatever the identity the story is trying to portray on the screen, we feel strongly that the people behind the camera and the people who feature in the film should also, as much as possible, have that same experience,” he said.

Samuel’s goal for the film is to dissuade people from underestimating those with a disability.

“I want everyone to know that disabled people demand respect and rights,” he said.

That message struck a chord with Brynne MacMurtry, an instructor at Project SEARCH, a one-year program at DHMC that helps young people with disabilities master useful employment skills.

A long-time admirer of Dan’s work, MacMurtry organized the screening as well as the Q&A with Samuel and Dan that will follow.

Showing the film at Dartmouth is a full-circle moment for Samuel, who receives much of his medical care at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center, including a deep brain stimulation operation featured in the film.

MacMurtry hopes that her interns leave the event feeling empowered.

“I want them to know that what Samuel’s going through is similar to things that they’re going through and look at where he is and all the cool things he’s doing and those things you can do too,” MacMurtry said.

The 4:30 screening and Q&A will take place in auditoriums E and F at DHMC. Admission is free and open to the public. A subsequent screening is scheduled for 2 p.m. on April 6 at the Hopkins Center. The film is rated R for strong language and references to sex.

The 10s return to Thetford

March 28 marks the opening night of Parish Players’ 17th annual Ten-Minute Play Festival. This year, explorations of intergenerational relationships and a “strong sense of place” unite the seven plays at the Eclipse Grange Theater in Thetford, said the festival’s co-producer Kate Magill.

Faith Catlin, a retired television actor living in Lyme, and Norwich filmmaker Nora Jacobson both have plays in the festival. Meanwhile, Magill will perform in “Five Miles Long, Two Hundred Feet High,” Michigan playwright Maripat Allen’s tale of a car journey across the Mackinac Bridge, which connects the state’s Upper and Lower peninsulas.

As a backpacker, one of Magill’s goals is to hike the North Country Trail, which crosses the bridge.

“That bridge has been on my radar for years,” she said.

Perhaps performing in the show will inspire her to take the leap.

The festival runs through Sunday, April 6. For tickets ($15-$25), visit parishplayers.org or call 802-785-4344.

Marion Umpleby can be reached at mumpleby@vnews.com or 603-727-3306.