By R. Scott Reedy, Correspondent
MetroWest Daily News
Like most stages in greater Boston, New Repertory Theatre hasn’t presented in-person performances since early March, when the company’s home, the Mosesian Center for the Arts in Watertown, closed its doors in response to the coronavirus pandemic.
While the Mosesian Center remains shuttered, New Rep – in partnership with the Watertown Free Public Library and the Historical Society of Watertown – will resume in-person performances with an outdoor run of “Watertown Historical Moving Plays: The Charles W. Lenox Experience” beginning Sept. 26.
Written by Ken Green and directed by Michael Ofori, the one-person show explores the life of Sgt. Charles W. Lenox, a black barber who enlisted as a private in the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment – a military unit immortalized by the Robert Gould Shaw Memorial on Boston Common, and depicted in the Academy Award-winning 1989 film “Glory.”
As Lenox, actor and former Framingham resident Kadahj Bennett will lead audience members on a socially distanced stroll through Watertown that will include stops at the onetime site of Lenox’s barbershop and the Watertown Soldiers’ Monument in Saltonstall Park.
By telephone recently from his home in Cambridge, New Repertory Theatre Artistic Director Michael J. Bobbitt discussed the company’s plans to present theater outdoors, the challenges of being in his line of work during a pandemic, and more.