At Villanova, the university president directs the school’s musical (and cheers on the basketball team)

In the weekend leading up to this Thursday’s opening of Villanova University’s brand-new, 400-seat Topper Theatre in the new $60 million Joan and John Mullen Center for the Performing Arts, Villanova President the Rev. Peter M. Donohue had a lot on his mind.

Would the cast be able to pull off the opening musical, “Curtains: A Musical Whodunnit?” Would he, directing the show at age 70, be able to leap onto the stage without falling? Would the elaborate staging work?

And then there was basketball.

Much as Donohue, who has multiple theater degrees, loves the stage , he won’t make the same mistake next time he directs a student performance. “I have certainly learned not to do it during basketball season,” he said in an interview Saturday afternoon. “There’s an expectation that I be there [at the games.]”

When the weekend opened, Villanova’s Wildcats had defeated the Michigan Wolverines in the NCAA Sweet Sixteen to clinch a spot in the Elite Eight round against the Houston Cougars in San Antonio on Saturday night.

But Donohue wasn’t at the game — not with theater performance set for Thursday requiring final rehearsals for Curtains. He’ll be at the Final Four game April 2.

For Donohue, who earned his bachelor’s degree from Villanova’s theater department and chaired the department for 14 years before being named Villanova’s president in 2006, directing actors on stage is a relief from the regular duties of college president.

He likes being president. He attributes his leadership style to lessons learned as a director, including trusting his staff and getting out of their way so they can do their jobs.

“I like to joke that they found me backstage and elevated me to the biggest acting job I ever had,” Donohue said. When he became president, he vowed to keep directing, but the pressures of the position made that impossible. The last time he directed a show was a decade ago.

Directing “is a way to connect with the students again and to be with them and talk to them,” he said. At first, during the auditions and casting, the students were very aware that they were working with the university president. “But,” he said, “as five or six weeks go by, they’ve forgotten I’m the president and they see me as the director.”

Even though in the past he directed many productions as a Villanova faculty member (earning him local Barrymore nominations and an award), things have changed — both for him and the students.

“I’m older, for one,” he said. “Jumping up on the stage is not as easy as it once was.” When he tried it out of muscle memory only to have it end more than a little awkwardly, people ran over to see if he was all right.

The students are different as well. “I’ve learned what is important to them, how they interact with each other,” he said. “It’s been an eye-opening experience. Students are very concerned about mental health and personal space. In theater, you forget about personal space.

“They want their breaks and time off and not to be pushing in rehearsals too much,” he said.

Curtains is the first performance in the Topper Theatre in the Joan and John Mullen Center for the Performing Arts. Donohue loves to list its many attributes, including rehearsal rooms, choral rooms, and three performance spaces, the largest being the 400-seat professional Topper Theatre with fly space, and lots of room backstage. “The building’s beautiful. It’s the space we never had.”

Donohue said he wanted to be involved in this first production (which had been delayed for two years because of the pandemic) because he had worked hard to make the building happen. Under his leadership, the university brought in six $1 million-plus gifts, including two topping $20 million, to create the performing arts center.

Curtains is a love letter to musical theater by John Kander and Fred Ebb, who composed “Cabaret” and “Chicago.” The cast of 20 includes faculty, graduate students, and undergrads. Villanova’s campus minister, Meghan Dietzler, plays a starry-eyed ingenue, and the Rev. David Cregan, a theater professor and the associate dean of academic affairs and strategic nitiatives for the College of Professional Studies, plays a starstruck gumshoe.

March 31 through April 10, Topper Theatre, Joan and John Mullen Center for the Performing Arts, Villanova University, 800 Lancaster Ave., Villanova. 610-519-7474 or villanovatheatre.org Masks required.

Philly Theatre Week (April 1 through April 10) is welcomed March 30 with an evening reception and celebration at the rooftop garden of the Kimmel Center. The event features performances from a half dozen groups including The Savoy Company with Gilbert and Sullivan tunes, The Hum’n’Bards Theatre Co. and the Painted Mug Café's joint offering of “Sing Out Louise! A Tribute to the Musicals We Love: Chicago,” and Brainchild Stageworkx’s performing a scene and songs from “The Ongoing Plight of the Ferryman,” among others.

If you are thinking about going to any theater — including some of the main stages — during Philly Theatre Week, first try to buy discounted Philly Theatre Week tickets via Theatre Philadelphia’s website before buying from the theater itself. Many theater companies are offering tickets at discounted prices (free, $15, $30) if purchased as part of Philly Theatre Week. Also, even if you can’t attend during Philly Theatre Week, you may be able to find discounted tickets for future shows.

Organized by Theatre Philadelphia, the theater community’s umbrella marketing and advocacy group, Philly Theatre Week is part of a plan to encourage audiences to come back to the theater, luring them with 85 different offerings and hundreds of performances across the region — 60% in person and 40% digital.

Opening night, March 30, 5-7 p.m.: Hamilton Garden at the Kimmel Cultural Campus’ Kimmel Center, 300 S. Broad St., Philadelphia. Free, but you need to register. Proof of vaccination and masks required. Philly Theatre Week: 267-761-9950 or theatrephiladelphia.org, which will also link to a ticket-buying site. COVID-19 protocols vary by venue, so check before you go.

The advantage of theater festivals is the opportunity to see one-off shows from emerging artists stretching the edges of their disciplines.

That’s the case with the seven contemporary circus shows gathered by Almanac Dance Circus Theater’s Miniball Festival at the Maas Building. Clown Alex Tatarsky will perform “Dirt Trip” described as an “etymological foray, essay as sashay,” choreographed in the realm between “falling and failing.”

“Surface Tension” by Liam Bradley and David Chervony is a daring look at queer friendship which utilizes “sincere juggling.” If you’d rather dance and drink, there’s “Happy Hour,” an Almanac Dance Circus Dance Theatre company piece that is an immersive and playful rebellion against a society too full of unspoken rules.

Philadelphia, says Ben Grinberg, Almanac’s cofounder, has become an emerging hub for circus arts, some of it growing out of the physical theater championed by Philadelphia’s Pig Iron Theatre Co. But like most emerging art forms, support for fledgling circus artists and their work isn’t easy to come by. While artists have the creative expertise (including juggling, aerial stunts, and acrobatics), they may lack necessary skills of fund-raising, marketing, venue selection, and sound/light technology, all of which is provided at Maas by Almanac.

“We’re trying to build that infrastructure at the smaller and more lean end of the arts environment,” Grinberg said.

Shows will be outdoors and indoors, with a few scheduled for each evening. In between performances, there’s a pleasant courtyard, a bar, usually some food, and music, either live or from a DJ. A fire circle invites conversation. To make the most of the time, tap a performer on the shoulder and ask questions.

April 3-8 with an opening-night fund-raiser on April 3 — food, drinks, performances. Maas Building, 1320 N. Fifth St., Philadelphia. 856-441-2837 or cannonballfestival.org/miniball Proof of vaccination required to enter Maas, and masks are required for indoor performances.

janevonbtheater@gmail.com