Quinn Mattfeld is a successful national stage actor, but until now his career had never brought him back to his home state of Washington.
Mattfeld, a Camas High School graduate, will get his chance to return in style this August, with a series of performances in Seattle as part of “Matilda the Musical,” produced by the Royal Shakespeare Company.
“I’ve done musicals before but never on this scale,” Mattfeld, 35, said of the national Broadway show tour, which kicks off this month in Los Angeles. “This musical, it started in the West End of London and has been just a huge hit. It was also Time magazine’s Show of the Year.”
The show also has received four Tony Awards and a Tony Honor for Excellence in the Theater.
It’s based on the novel by best-selling author Roald Dahl (“Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” “Fantastic Mr. Fox”), and tells the story of an extraordinary girl who dreams of a better life.
Mattfeld said before he was cast, he got to check out the show on Broadway in New York City.
“I saw it, and I thought, ‘This could be my favorite musical that I’ve ever seen,’ ” Mattfeld said. “And this musical, it’s a pretty broad world. My world has been mostly classical theater and period stuff, so this is a great opportunity for me.”
Mattfeld plays Matilda’s father, Mr. Wormwood, who’s a bit of an unlikable character, he admitted.
“Mr. Wormwood, he continues to act as though Matilda is a boy,” Mattfeld said. “He doesn’t know how to talk to her and he’s a bit of a scary authoritarian.”
Wormwood thinks that his daughter should stop reading books and watch more television, like her brother, Mattfeld said.
“I have a song, actually, called ‘All I Know I Learned From Telly,’ the English word for television,” he said. “My character likes to extoll the virtues of television.”
While it’s his first professional return to the area, it’s far from his first return visit. Mattfeld heads back to his hometown of Camas as often as he can and still has many relatives in Clark County, he said.
“My dad worked at the Camas Paper Mill as an electrician for 40 years,” he said. “And my mom taught second grade at Burton Elementary.”
He got his bachelor’s degree in theater at the University of Oregon and his master of fine arts at Penn State University. He has been a professional actor for about 15 years, he said.
One of his first roles was in a small ensemble cast on Broadway, he said.
“I was basically stage parsley,” Mattfeld said. “I was like a green accouterment that makes the production look good.”
But not long after, his career started to take off. Since then he’s done a lot of regional theater, with PCPA Theaterfest, Great Lakes Theater, the Illinois Shakespeare Festival and the Utah Shakespeare Festival.
“This is my first big traveling production,” Mattfeld said. “And it’s great that it’s bringing me back home for the first time.”
There’s also another reason he’s excited to come home for the show, he said, tongue planted firmly in cheek.
“All I really care about is making sure I get Burgerville when I get home,” Mattfeld said. “Oh, and of course, I’d love to visit Camas if I have time. My mom still lives there, my grandma still lives there and I have tons of relatives in the area.”
