Judah Immanuel in Dingbat's production of

Although the various performing arts organizations around Sarasota make it look easy, producing theater is an incredibly difficult task. The play or musical that audiences see before them on any given night is the product of months and months of preparation from both the on stage talent and the production team. The team over at Dingbat Theatre Project knows this well. Founded in 2020, the 501(c)3 non-profit wraps up its fifth year of production this weekend with its run of Pippin.

It’s a milestone from a company that was started out of nothing more than a few friends with a dream of creating theater. “We’re a super small company,” says Luke Manual, founder and producing artistic director. “A lot of what we do is resource-based on what we have and the time that we’re able to commit to it.”

Dingbat’s next slate of mainstage shows will kick off on July 25, with Dingbat’s Hercules, and will be a part of an eight-show season that runs through June 2026. “Dingbat’s Hercules is a project my friend Austin Howeth and I have been working on for about seven or eight years at this point,” says Manual. “It’s a two person comedic interpretation of the Hercules myth, kind of in the style of Greater Tuna or The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged). There are 12 monsters that Hercules has to defeat and Austin and I trade off who plays Hercules and who plays the monster each time.”

Dinbat prides itself on providing accessible theater for all types of audiences. Sometimes, that means edgier, R-rated productions like Samantha Fuller’s I’m Going to Marry You, Tobey Maguire—a comedic romp about a 14-year-old girl who kidnaps Tobey Maguire at the height of his fame in 2004 only to find that her idol is not the prince charming she thinks him to be. Other times that means adapting childhood classics into family friendly shows like Dingbat’s Winne-the-Pooh, set to premiere in December. “A big part of what we try to do at Dingbat is trying to make theater as inclusive and accessible as possible, which includes people with kids and kids themselves,” says Manual. “Winnie-the-Pooh is adapted directly from the novel—I took a red pen to the book and cut out everything that I felt was extra fat and then we’ll present the book as is.”

Dingbat Theatre Project, 7288 S Tamiami Trail, Sarasota, 34231, 941-451-7706

Judah Immanuel in Dingbat's production of

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