Making Theater Magic

There’s no shortage of imagination at Northwestern. Students pursue music, literature, dance, visual arts and more, creating a robust artistic environment with many avenues for expression. For theater department chair Henry Godinez, though, the magic happens when all those artistic disciplines come together to realize one vision: a theatrical performance. Last December he gathered a team of students and staff and read from the script of the famous 1965 Broadway musical Man of La Mancha: 

When life itself seems lunatic, who knows where madness lies? Perhaps to be too practical is madness. To surrender dreams — this may be madness. … And maddest of all, to see life as it is, and not as it should be. 

With these lines, Godinez kicked off the first design meeting for the Virginia Wadsworth Wirtz Center for the Performing Arts’ production of Man of La Mancha. Students would go on to build a set from scratch; design unique costumes, props and lighting rigs; and rehearse for hours on end to make this dream a reality.

One of the world’s most frequently staged musicals, Man of La Mancha is set in a prison in late 16th-century Spain during the Spanish Inquisition. When Miguel de Cervantes, author of the seminal novel Don Quixote, and his trusty sidekick are imprisoned there, they convince their fellow prisoners to participate in a theatrical retelling of the novel. Cervantes becomes Don Quixote, knight errant, and his friend, the devoted squire Sancho Panza. It is a “play within a play,” Godinez explains.

But Northwestern’s production had a timely twist. Directed by Godinez, the Carlos Montezuma Professor in the School of Communication, the play was set not in a Spanish prison but in a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center on the U.S.-Mexico border, where prisoners await deportation. The idea, says Godinez, came from his daughter Gabby Godinez ’21, who had planned to produce the play during her senior year at Northwestern. (The COVID-19 pandemic indefinitely postponed those plans.)

The show, which ran at Northwestern’s Ethel M. Barber Theater this spring, was just one of 40-plus productions during the Wirtz Center’s 2024–25 season. With myriad opportunities to gain professional-level experience onstage and behind the scenes, students are empowered to take leading roles where they can experiment and find their artistic voices. And when the lights go down, the magic begins.

“Theater gets right to the core of who we are as human beings,” says Godinez. “It has the power to make us think. But more importantly, it has the power to make us feel. And right now, we … need to know what it feels like … to be human. We all have so many more things in common than things that divide us. That’s why we need theater right now.”

Inside the Costume Shop

Inspired by the play’s reimagined setting — at the U.S.-Mexico border — costumer designer Josie Everett ’25 MFA incorporated Mexican textiles into her costumes, along with elements from El Teatro Campesino (a Latino theater company founded in 1965 in California, the same year Man of La Mancha debuted at the Goodspeed Opera House in Connecticut). She sourced fabrics from local thrift shops and the Wirtz Center’s extensive collection of materials.

Costumes play an important role in the story, says Everett. When Cervantes enters the detention center, he brings along a chest full of costumes and props and introduces himself as a "poet." Director Henry Godinez also notes that Cervantes was a playwright and a contemporary of Shakespeare.

“A lot of the costumes from Cervantes’ chest are inspired by late 16th-century and early 17th-century Spanish silhouettes,” says costume designer Josie Everett.

DESIGNING THE SET

Scenic designer A Inn Doo, a third-year MFA student, researched photographs of defunct box stores that had been repurposed as detention centers along the U.S.-Mexico border. She wanted the set for this production to “metaphorically tell the relationship of the United States to immigrants — where they import people as needed and then throw them away like commodities,” she says.  

Doo then created this 1/4-inch scale model of the Barber Theater to map out her vision, complete with tiny props. 

After finalizing her design, Doo worked with staff and students to construct the set, using the Wirtz Center’s paint and scenic design shops. For example, in the show’s final scene, Cervantes and his friend are loaded into the back of a truck to be deported. With limited space backstage, Doo designed this large wooden box with a metal frame and black interior to create the illusion of a truck extending far into the distance.  

Onstage, Cervantes and his friend hold either end of a large wooden chest as they prepare to step into the back of what appears to be a truck. Other detainees look on from the sidelines.

An early-stage rehearsal in the Barber Theater shows Doo’s nearly finished set design. The drab colors, leftover pallets and rickety shelves create a bleak, hopeless atmosphere in the detention center.

The completed set design shows merchandise shelves that have been repurposed as bunk beds for detainees. 

But the atmosphere changes when Cervantes invites his fellow detainees — and, by extension, the audience — to imagine the vibrant world of Don Quixote. As they act out Quixote’s story, grocery carts become noble steeds, an industrial ceiling fan becomes a windmill, and a dolly becomes a confessional booth. “Imagination is the only thing that people cannot take away from us,” says Doo.

From left, Verónica Bazan Garrubbo ’25, junior Mackenzie Kirkwood and Anne-Sophie Lacombe García ’25, practice their roles as Antonia, Padre and the housekeeper, respectively.