courtesty photo Lois Richters and Ralph Nielsen sing "For Me and My Gall" during intermission of the 1988 melodrama.

by Theodore Wiesehan

    It begins each May as the tour buses converge on Goehner.
     "This year we had a total of 40 tour buses," Ralph Nielsen said. "We even had one last year that was a mystery tour based out of Yankton, South Dakota."
     "I never expected it to be what it's become," Caryl Schulz added. "It's kind of interesting that people from all over the state know Goehner by the melodrama."
     Last May marked the 20th year that Nielsen, Schulz and others from the Goehner area have presented caped and moustached villains, dashing heroes, tragic heroines and the chance for audience members to boo and cheer and lose themselves in an old-fashioned melodrama.
     "When the town of Goehner celebrated its centennial I suggested that we have a melodrama," Schulz said, "and you know what happens when you suggest something. You're it."
     Schulz planned to hold two performances (they ended up presenting six showings due to popular demand) and enlisted the help of Seward High School drama teacher Roger Harpham. During the 2006 season they held 31 showings and Harpham directed the melodrama for his 20th year.
     "If we hadn't had him (Harpham) to give us ideas and push us onward we wouldn't have gotten as far as we had," Nielsen said.
     The cast of Ten Nights in a Barroom, the first Goehner melodrama, arrived with little, if any, acting experience.
     "I would have given anything to be in a play, but I never had enough nerve to try out for one," Nielsen said. "Caryl came up with the idea. She said, 'You would make a wonderful villain,' and I said, 'Oh no. I've never done this before.'
     "But deep down in my heart I really wanted to do it. I made up my mind I was going to do it. I wanted to do it so bad, and I was probably never ever going to get a chance again, or so I thought."
     Neither Schulz nor her husband Lloyd, who has also acted in every performance with the group, had any theater experience before either.
     "I didn't intend really to be in the first one," Caryl said, "but the director...he thought that I would be able to fill the role of Goldie in our first drama."
     Of course, sharing 20 years of performances means sharing thousands of laughs and memories, and the melodrama's history is full of amusing stories.
     "I tell you, there's so many funny things that happened that I know we could write a book," Nielsen said.
     Many of Nielsen's anecdotes begin with his character strangling or somehow plotting to murder Caryl's character, as he plays the part of the villain year after year, complete with top hat and cape.
     One particularly memorable story occurred during a scene in which Nielsen was supposed to choke Caryl's character and wrestle her to the side of the stage. At the moment she was pushed behind the curtain, Nielsen was to grab a dummy in the same dress as Caryl and "really went to town."
     "When I picked the dummy up," Nielsen laughed, "I was standing on her dress and when I picked her up in the air her skirt came off. I didn't realize it because the lights were flickering...but you can well be assured that it brought the house down."
     Caryl recounted a performance of Dark Deeds at Swan's Place when Kenny Kloke was supposed to come onstage with a live fish in his shirt because his character nearly drowned in the ocean.
     "He kept the fish outside in water and he went out to get it and there was a cat outside," Caryl said. "The cat decided that was his territory and Kenny was nearly attacked by the cat because the cat decided he wanted the fish, too."
     One of Nielsen's favorites is the time Lloyd and Caryl were supposed to paddle offstage in a styrofoam boat while singing a song.
     Whether from paddling too quickly or singing too slowly, they didn't finish the song by the time the boat reached the curtain and paddled backwards until the final refrain before continuing offstage.
     Cal and Pam Williams designed and built sets for the productions since the very first show, and learned a lot about set construction along the way.
     The first sets were built of plywood. They were heavy and difficult to move. The shelves for the first production of Ten Nights in a Barroom consisted of an old bookshelf on which each cast member painted a bottle of liquor.
     These days, the Williamses have honed their craft and make most of their sets of light-weight styrofoam.
     Audiences get into the action, as well, booing, applauding and even heckling.
     "It was a prime rib dinner night and somebody threw a chicken bone at me," Nielsen laughed of one instance.
     He said the heckling used to bother him, but these days he can give as good as he gets.
     "About halfway through a show, one of my lines was, 'I've got to get some money,' and one guy in the back yelled, 'Why don't you sell your toupee?'" Nielsen said.
     Without missing a beat, Nielsen shot back at him, "Why don't you get back on the bus?"
     While several of the cast members have been with the melodramas from the beginning, the productions bring in their share of younger cast members through the years.
     "The neat part of this whole thing is it's an intergenerational effort and I think that these young kids really learn a lot plus enjoy the interaction with older adults," Caryl said. "It's just been a really good endeavor that way."
     Caryl throws a party for the cast every New Year's Eve. Lloyd said she used to invite all the performers from previous years but as time passed the number of past actors and actresses grew too large.
     "The core people have been there pretty much all the time and haven't had any fist fights that I remember," Lloyd said. "Of course we're in pretty close quarters for three months every year. Out of it friendships have evolved and some of the gals go out together and stuff that wouldn't have otherwise."
     Friendships and entertainment are not the only fruits of the melodrama, however. Since 1988, the proceeds from the town's performance have gone to a perpetual scholarship fund. To date the fund has awarded $102,000 in scholarships to area students.
     After 20 years of entertainment, the future of the Goehner melodrama hangs in the air like the fate of a heroine.
     "There are always rumors," Caryl said. "It's not that we're tired of it, I don't know. I don't like to say one way or the other, because if we do decide to do it (the melodrama) then the word's out that we're not going to. We've talked about it (stopping the show) because it's been kind of a long time, but I don't think that's definite."
     "I said this was going to be my last year and I probably will stick with it," Nielsen said. "I will miss it. I'll miss it terribly, but we're not getting any younger."