Musicals return to SFSU with ‘Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play’

Musicals return to SFSU with ‘Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play’ Musicals return to SFSU with ‘Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play’ SFSU Players Club co-directors Zeno Zacks and Avayna Glass prepare for a post-apocalyptic retelling of ‘The Simpsons’ that explores storytelling, survival and the bonds formed in uncertain times. Chad Church, News Editor • Oct 12, 2026 Chad Church Art depicting Simpsons characters displays the breakdown in memory of post-apocalyptic survivors during a rehearsal of “Mr Burns: A Post-Electric Play” at The Little Theatre in the Creative Arts building on Oct. 6, 2026. (Chad Church / Golden Gate Xpress) For the first time since spring 2023, musical theatre hits the stage at San Francisco State University  this week as the SFSU Players Club makes their final preparations for Mr Burns: A Post-Electric Play. The production, co-directed by fourth-year theatre arts major Zeno Zacks and second-year cinema major Avayna Glass, will be performed on Tuesday, Oct. 13, and Thursday, Oct. 15, in The Little Theatre in the Creative Arts building. Glass’ previous work with Zacks as the assistant director to the Player’s Club’s fall 2025 performance of “The Seagull” sees revived synergy in “Mr Burns : A Post-Electric Play.” “I feel like we bounce off of each other fairly well,” Zacks said. “There have been a lot of times where I feel like I’ve seen Avayna give a note that I was a second away from giving.” Axel Tomelloso sings as Bart Simpson during a rehearsal of Act 3 of “Mr Burns: A Post-Electric Play” at The Little Theatre in the Creative Arts building on Oct. 6, 2026. (Chad Church / Golden Gate Xpress) A testament to the pair’s creative connection, Glass reiterated the same sentiment. “And vice versa,” Glass said. “There’s been a lot of moments where there’ll be something I have no idea what we should do and then he’ll be like, ‘I have an idea,’ and I’m like, ‘thank God.’” Though the play’s title refers to Mr. Burns, the decrepit nuclear plant owner from ‘The Simpsons’, the show goes much deeper than a shallow depiction of the long-running cartoon. According to first-year English literature major Iphis Abram’s dramaturgical analysis, “Anne Washburn’s ‘Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play’ examines the process of oral storytelling not in a pre-writing society, but a post-apocalyptic, post-electric one. The stories being told are not born from oral tradition, but rather episodes of ‘The Simpsons,’ an animated TV show, reconstructed from memory now that the original recordings are lost. The play opens shortly after a nuclear disaster has destroyed much of the world and diminished the human population from over seven billion to a few hundred million. A group of survivors sit around a campfire telling stories of a world that no longer is.  As they sit around the campfire, each character is shouldering the burdens of losing loved ones. They attempt to give each other some sense of normalcy by remembering songs and television shows that they no longer have access to. Matt, a survivor played by fourth-year theatre arts major Dominic Terrado, leads the group in recalling Season 5 Episode 2 of ‘The Simpsons’ titled ‘Cape Feare.’  “[Matt is] someone who’s just trying to grasp onto whatever is familiar because the world ended,” Terrado said. “He’s the type of person that just latches onto anything to give him some semblance of what the world was like. And if that means ‘The Simpsons,’ then that means ‘The Simpsons.’” Christian Dulce, Amanda Farmer and Clara Picó Salort (left to right) take the stage for a rehearsal of Act 2 of “Mr Burns: A Post-Electric Play” at The Little Theatre in the Creative Arts building on Oct. 6, 2026. (Chad Church / Golden Gate Xpress) Act 1’s group retelling of the episode is filled with imperfections that make their recollections feel human. As they piece together a familiar story from memory, the shared experience gives them a way to connect with one another in a world that has been irrevocably changed. That connection eventually grows beyond the campfire. Act 2 follows Matt and the other survivors as they form a traveling theater company, sharing stories from the past with others while building a community of their own. As the group grows closer, its members begin to find a sense of normalcy in their new lives. For Jenny, portrayed by theater arts master’s student Amanda Farmer, that means navigating the unfamiliar experience of building a life and finding love after the apocalypse. “Jenny survived the apocalypse, but was separated from her family. She is creating a life for herself in this new world that is unlike anything she could have imagined for herself,” Farmer said. “She finds love, which is also kind of a weird thing for her. I think that the way that love works in this post-apocalypse is different than the way that we understand it. I think there’s a lot of trauma in all of the characters.”  The play’s themes of connection and community extend beyond the survivors’ campfire. For first-year theatre arts major Ronnie Gardner, who plays the survivor Sam in acts one and two and the reporter Troy McClure in Act 3, the story highlights how people can find common ground in unlikely circumstances. “It’s all of these people from completely different backgrounds coming together and trying to bond over just one little thing. Which is ‘The Simpsons,’ because that’s pretty much  all they’ve got right now,” Gardner said. “I find the theme of togetherness and trying to find a common thing people can bond over and then really elevating on that in Act 2.” Christian Dulce, Ronnie Gardner and Amanda Farmer (left to right) build up to their characters’ big argument in a rehearsal of Act 2 of “Mr Burns: A Post-Electric Play” at The Little Theatre in the Creative Arts building on Oct. 6, 2026. (Chad Church / Golden Gate Xpress) As the first and second acts wrap up, we are thrown into the wackiness of Act 3, which takes place over 70 years after the initial nuclear disaster that sent the world spiraling into chaos. At this point in the story, there is little left to serve as a lens into what the past was like.  ‘The Simpsons’ transformed from a silly way for survivors to remember their old lives into a serious and strange framework for storytelling. The rendition of ‘Cape Feare’ we see in Act 3 is a twisted and convoluted version of the episode that fans of ‘The Simpsons’ would know today. With many cast members doubling with roles in this production and THA 690’s oncoming production, directors and crew have been working on an extreme time crunch. “It’s certainly been an everyday process. Especially during rehearsal, you have to be fully in the moment, locked in, making sure everything works right,” Zacks said. “Every day there always is a good one to two hours after, of emailing people and scheduling a crew day to go and build the sets and writing the next call sheets.”  Being part of an SFSU Players Club production doesn’t hold the same prerequisite requirements as THA 690. The club’s accessibility opens opportunities for underclassmen, such as first-year theatre arts major Andrea Myer, to gain valuable experience on and off stage. “It’s just been overall a great experience because I’ve been able to build connections. I was hanging out with some of the actors yesterday, which I never even would have thought of back in high school,” Myer said. “Back in high school, there’s kind of a divide between crew and actors. With Mr. Burns, it doesn’t feel cliquey at all. It feels like we’re all like one family.” Tickets for the Tuesday, Oct. 13 and Thursday, Oct. 15, showings can be purchased at the School of Theatre and Dance ticketing website for $15 for the general public or $10 for senior citizens and students.  View Story Comments 1 Like This Story Share on Facebook Share on X Email this Story Print this Story Leave a Comment More to Discover More in Culture DJ Union aims to make student-made music more accessible on campus Iced coffee, tattoos and interviews: How SFSU students are getting hired Review: ‘Resident Evil’ is unashamed of its video game roots About the Contributor Chad Church, News Editor Chad Church (he/him) is the news editor for The Golden Gate Xpress. He is majoring in journalism and minoring in race and resistance. He was born in Morgan Hill and lived there all his life until moving to San Francisco last summer. He has had work published in The TLVoice and Broke-Ass-Stuart. When he is not at work or school, he enjoys watching baseball, playing poker and getting political.