DETROIT—Wayne State’s Hilberry Theatre opens its production of Tony Kushner’s Angels in America Part 2 on April 26, which will run through May 12. The theater offers audiences the rare opportunity of seeing both parts of this modern American classic when it will run Angels in America Part 1 on May 5 at 2:00 pm, with Part 2 at 8:00pm; and on May 11 Part 1 will run at 3:00 pm with Part 2 at 8:00 pm. Tickets must be purchased separately and are available online at www.theatreanddanceatwayne.com.

In Part 1 of this two-part epic, Prior Walter, a young man living in NYC in 1985, is diagnosed with AIDS. His boyfriend, Louis, struggling to cope with the disease and his own fears, abandons him. Alone, Prior struggles until he’s visited by ancestral ghosts who herald the coming of a fierce angel. At the same time, Joe Pitt, a conservative but closeted Mormon, is offered a high profile job in Washington, D.C., by his mentor, the McCarthyist lawyer Roy Cohn. Joe’s wife Harper, who struggles with her own illness, refuses to move.

Following the events of Part 1, Part 2 continues the complex and fantastical examination of homosexuality, race, and AIDS in 1980s America. Fighting illness and losing hope, Prior Walter is hesitant to become the prophet as demanded by the Angel. Roy Cohn is hospitalized, diagnosed with “liver cancer,” and under the care of Belize. Harper has disappeared and Joe’s mother has arrived to try to put her family back together.

This production contains simulated sexual activity and full frontal nudity.