Dear Friends,
Nick Cornelison and Ed Fallon read during Iowa Stage Theater’s Scriptease of IT CAN’T HAPPEN HERE. Photo credit Brittny Rebhuhn.
This week, I found a new way to speak out against the rise of fascism – or rather, a new way found me.
Last month, John Earl Robinson with the Iowa Stage Theater Company asked me to read the lead part in a 2016 adaptation of Sinclair Lewis’ It Can’t Happen Here — a play about America’s imagined (but frighteningly realistic) descent into fascism in the 1930s.
This past Monday, I read the part of Doremus Jessup at the Company’s first Scriptease of 2026. Jessup is a newspaper editor who at first dismisses the threat of fascism. Yet after Buz Windrip is elected President and institutes martial law, Jessup joins the opposition — and nearly gets killed. Other resistance fighters do, indeed, die. Everyone suffers. It’s not a pretty picture, though the play ends with a modicum of encouragement.
Lewis wrote It Can’t Happen Here in response to the spread of fascism in Europe in the 1930s, and as fascism in the US was gaining strength and momentum.
Some of the cast reading IT CAN’T HAPPEN HERE. Photo credit Brittny Rebhuhn, Iowa Stage Theatre Company.
Nearly 100 years later, fascism is again a very real threat in our country. And let’s not kid ourselves — fascism is absolutely where America is headed if we don’t right the listing ship of democracy.
It’s all hands on deck, folks.
No Kings protests.
Speaking out at forums, letters-to-editors, and online.
Helping elect candidates who defend democracy.
Building local communities of support for people in the crosshairs of this administration’s efforts to divide, arrest, marginalize, and silence us.
For me, participating in the reading of It Can’t Happen Here was one additional way to contribute to raising awareness about the threat we face. I hope Iowa Stage Theater runs it as a full-blown production, and that theater companies across the country do the same.
And I hope each of you continue to do what you can to push back against the centralization of power by this unholy alliance of big business and an executive branch amassing more and more control — damn the separation of powers outlined in our Constitution.
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THIS WEEK’S PROGRAM IS A RE-RUN OF RELEVANT CONTENT FROM EARLIER THIS YEAR
(01:02) Politics shouldn’t be a “blood sport” – LISTEN
(11:13) There’s a MAGA rebellion underway, with Rekha Basu – LISTEN
(26:38) Trump’s threat to nationalize the 2026 general election – LISTEN
(42:33) Eminent domain huge issue for Iowa voters, with Charles Goldman – LISTEN
(56:54) How cities benefit from urban agriculture, with Kathy Byrnes – LISTEN
Thanks for reading, listening, and taking action. And if you’re a central Iowa resident, remember to support the local businesses and nonprofits that help underwrite this platform.
Ed Fallon
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