Justin Peck (Banquo, Doctor) is a Duluth-based director and actor. Recent directing credits include Constellations (The Lab), Pride & Prejudice (Zeitgeist), Mr. Burns (Underground), and Spamalot (NorShor). Recent on-stage credits include Peter and the Starcatcher (Smee) and Annie (FDR) at the Duluth Playhouse. Up next, he will be appearing on the NorShor stage once again in The One-Act Play That Goes Wrong. Justin is also a member of the local D&D podcast Twin Portals. Love to his family, especially Jody, who fills his life with magic. Thank you for supporting local theater!

John Pokrzywinski (Duncan, Messenger, Siward) is thrilled to be onstage with Zeitgeist Theater! Favorite acting credits include The Arsonists; Death of a Salesman; Annapurna; Vanya, Sonya, Masha, and Spike/THE DULUTH PLAYHOUSE. The Realistic Joneses and Stones in His Pockets/ RENEGADE THEATER. Thom Pain, Based on Nothing/ FALLEN SPARROW. Hamlet/ WISE FOOL. The Food Chain/ DARK HORSE. John has also directed at most theaters above as well as East High and Ordean East Middle schools. John has been a middle grades teacher for three decades.

Robert Lee (Macbeth) Robert honestly can’t believe this show is finally happening! And he is incredibly relieved to finally dump it out of his head. Robert gets around… You can find him in various performance venues around town doing various thing. He often does improv at Renegade Improv on Friday nights, and sometimes he gets up for a standup open mic at The Jade Fountain or Dubh Linn’s. Upcoming performances include Duluth’s funniest person contest, The One-Act Play that Goes Wrong, Drinksgiving, and The Ball Dropping Show. Next spring he’s directing Every Brilliant Thing. And next Fall he’s directing his lightly adapted version of La Ronde. Robert Stays pretty busy, so you’ll probably stumble upon his work at some point.

Eric Elefson (Macduff) is thrilled to be performing in Macbeth, his first production with Zeitgeist Theater! A local theatre artist, Eric spent a few years after college working in the Twin Cities before moving to Two Harbors, MN. Some of Eric’s favorite past roles include Tommy DeVito (Jersey Boys), Bank Manager (Once), and Christy Mahon (The Playboy of the Western World). Eric also runs a yurt stay with his beautiful spouse, Kayla. You can find out more about their yurt at www.wildhavenmn.com. Also follow him on Instagram @ericeire. In his spare time, Eric plays guitar, reads old books, and hikes. As always, love to Mother and Dad.

Kate Horvath (Lady Macbeth, Son) is a professional actor, director, and educator based in Duluth, MN. Kate has acted locally, regionally, and in NYC for more than 25 years. Select acting credits include: Juliet (Romeo & Juliet), Hermia (Midsummer), Horatio (Hamlet), Little Red (Into The Woods), Crissy (HAIR), and Mimi (RENT). She has directed 60+ productions including POTUS for Zeitgeist Theatre, Twelfth Night, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Romeo & Juliet, Hamlet, Titus Andronicus, SHREK, Hairspray, CATS, The Lion King, Jr., and Mary Zimmerman’s Metamorphoses. Kate is most proud of leading the Duluth Playhouse Children’s Theatre & Education Programs for a decade. Next, Kate will direct The Ice Fishing Play at UMD – completing a full year of being “unretired” from theatre.

Karen Niedermier (The Porter) is thrilled to be joining this fabulous cast. Past roles at Zeitgeist include a Zookeeper in Birds of a Feather, and several creatures in The Wonderful World of Chris Monroe. You may also have seen her in the 2024 What She Said Festival at the Duluth Playhouse Lab. She has been practicing stumbling drunk down the stairs, and is thrilled you are here to see her restaurant debut!

Sacha Mozenter (Hand to the King) is thrilled to be in Macbeth a Dinner Party at Zeitgeist. This is his second show at Zeitgeist, his previous role being Oberon in Midsummer Night’s Dream in Hartley Park where he made his Zeitgeist debut. This is his first “professional” acting experience with adults instead of other kids. He’s so excited for this show and hopes to see you at future Zeitgeist productions!

MarySue Taallerud (Servant) was last seen, on stage, performing in a 1997 Duluth Playhouse production of the Scottish Play. This current, innovative, production has lured her back! MarySue is a recently retired educator.

Katie Kampfhenkel (Stage Manager) Katie is originally from Katy, Texas, and moved to Duluth in 2018. She graduated with a BFA in Stage Management and minors in Marketing and Communications from the University of Minnesota Duluth. She has been busy working as the Production Manager for the Minnesota Ballet and is super thrilled that this production worked with her schedule. She has loved this unique experience and can’t wait for you all to watch these actors shine. Katie would like to thank her mom and boyfriend for all of their support and to also send a special shoutout to her dad who is looking down on her as her guardian angel from above.

I’ve come up with a lot of wild ideas over the years. A lot. And I usually convince people to help make them happen; I’m pretty convincing.  But there’s been one idea that has stuck with me longer than any. Macbeth as a dinner party. And that was the whole idea at first. Why Macbeth? Because it’s my favorite play, it’s got it all! Why a dinner party? I have no fu@#cking idea, but it probably has something to do with my love for cooking for people. But for some reason, that idea was in my head. And for more than a decade the idea has been clarifying little by little. Every once in a while I’d bring it up to people and we would muse about what it meant – those conversations with those people whittled away at the obscurity of the idea. I often went back and read or researched the play and new directions would come out of it. I watched film adaptations of Macbeth, and interpretations would lend themselves to this dinner party idea. It stuck with me for so long because it wasn’t ready. The idea was still cooking.

Then Justin Peck introduced me to a book called My Life with the Shakespeare Cult by Samuel McClure Taylor. It talked about how Shakespeare wrote his plays without the idea of the fourth wall (the invisible barrier between the audience and the actors). His language was meant to include the audience, to be spoken directly to them. This book articulated a lot of things I always felt about Shakespeare. And suddenly, my little idea, Macbeth as a dinner party, crystallized. Shakespeare, food, intimacy, a party. And it was time to go! I rallied some of the best actors in Duluth, and we were ready! It was time for this idea to be conjured onto the stage! The only problem was it was 2020.

Covid took so much from the world. And like so many I was forced to let go of something I was so passionate about. My little idea went and hid away again, but ideas don’t die. And this one kept getting sharper in my subconscious. During the pandemic I started a food business and learned to cook for 100+ people at a time. Stuart Gordon and I bonded in a really geeky foodie way. I focused on comedy (the world needed joy). Then, as Mary Fox was launching a new Zeitgeist Theatre season, I tossed this idea in her basket and she enthusiastically said yes, without a single question (this is Mary’s best quality and the source of most of her stress). That was a little over a year ago. I rallied many of the old cast from 2020, I held auditions where I met some incredible artists (and resulted in some excruciating decisions). This cast believes in this idea and they are making it so much better than it has ever been in my head. They are the final ingredient.

This idea is better now. Doing the show in an actual restaurant makes it more authentic. The show has to be simple and immediate. Creating the show this way means it can’t be permanent, which also means it can be done anywhere. Doing the show in a found space has informed the content in really amazing ways. It also means that Stuart and I have been able to push the food to a new level. The ingredients are simple, the flavors familiar, but the ideas are fresh and elevated.

After living with this idea for so long it is really strange to see it become the experience it is. It’s exciting and scary. I hope my idea brings you some joy. Macbeth is a scary, tragic, funny, and beautiful play, and this is how I wanted you to experience it. And if you have a little idea that makes no sense, maybe stick with it.

-Robert

Bill Alexander and the First United Methodist Church Handbell Program, Jeremy Craycraft and The College of St. Scholastica Music Department, Blake Thomas, Sarah Lueck and The Zeitgeist Restaurant & Bar.