Welcome to THE RUNDOWN, a quick hit highlight of what's on stage in Michigan. February is almost over, Spring is in the air, and the lights are brightly shining across the Great Lakes State. It's the last weekend in February, and we've got you covered with what's coming, what's going. and what to see before it's gone.
There's something due any day; around the corner and whistling down the river!
PLACES PLEASE, THIS IS YOUR PLACES CALL!
Here's THE RUNDOWN for Thursday, February 27, 2025.
NOW PLAYING
RINALDO | Detroit Opera | Feb 22 - March 2
Handel’s Baroque blockbuster is viewed through the lens of a child’s fantasy in a contemporary pediatric ward. The young patients venture on a heroic journey, where knights, sorcerers, monsters, and magic are used as a salve for unimaginable challenges.
Conducted by: Detroit Opera Music Director Roberto Kalb.
FRANKIE AND JOHNNY BUILD A PRISON | Runs through March 1
Frankie and Johnny Build a Prison is a world premiere play by local playwright Matt Harmon. When novice carpenter Frankie and incarcerated Johnny meet while building a visitation window in a county prison, security cameras loom in the corner of the room, watching their every move. A work assignment gives way to romantic interest, and the two must confront their captors, their pasts, and time to be together.
CLOSING THIS WEEKEND
"It’s a beautiful story that [shows] the connection between two people, regardless of time or space.” -X. Alexander Durden
Written by: Mat Harmon
Directed by: Dani Poppe
THE ANGEL NEXT DOOR | Meadow Brook Theatre | Runs Feb 12-March 9
A new screwball comedy runs at Meadow Brook Theatre through March 9. It’s 1948, in a ritzy Newport mansion populated by playwrights, actors, a young star-struck author, and the housekeeper who would like all of them to leave. When their weekend getaway goes horribly awry, only a play within the play can save the day. A screwball comedy that’s in love with theater, about people in love with theater, who know that, sometimes, even reality needs a rewrite to reach a happy ending.
Written by: Paul Slade Smith
Directed by: Travis W. Walter
A CASE FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD | Williamston Theatre | Runs Feb 6-March 16
Mid-Michigan’s award-winning professional theatre company, Williamston Theatre, is starting off 2025 with the Michigan Premiere. Performances for this production begin Thursday, February 6 and run through Sunday, March 16. With humor, empathy, and deep compassion, this production intertwines two lives in a story about fatherhood, family, and friendship.
Written by: Samuel D. Hunter
Directed by: Jasmine Rivera
MA RAINEY'S BLACK BOTTOM | The Detroit Reparatory Theatre | Runs Jan 10-March 2
The Detroit Repertory Theatre continues its 68th season and the August Wilson American Century Cycle with its production of
Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom. Running now through March 2, 2025. Performances are four times a week, Fridays at 8PM, Saturdays at 3PM & 8PM, and Sundays at 2PM.
CLOSING THIS WEEKEND!
Written by: August Wilson
Directed by: Casaundra Freeman
FOURTEEN FUNERALS | The Purple Rose | Runs Feb 6-March 9
The Purple Rose continues its 2024-25 season with this Michigan Premiere and running through March 9. City-girl Sienna gets a cryptic phone call about the untimely deaths of some distant family members. Maybe she’s hoping for a big inheritance. Maybe she just really needs to get away from her dead-end life. LIMITED TICKETS
Written by: Eric Pfeffinger
Directed by: Rhiannon Ragland
CONFEDERATES | The Detroit Public Theatre | Runs Feb 8-March 16
Detroit Public Theatre (DPT) continues the acclaimed run of CONFEDERATES, by DPT Executive Artistic Producer, MacArthur Genius award-winning, Tony nominated, Dominique Morisseau.
This searing and acclaimed play leaps back and forth in time to hold an unyielding lens to the racism and gender biases that plague America's institutions to this day. Performances run through Sunday, March 16.
Written by: Dominique Morisseau
Directed by: Goldie E. Patrick
AVENUE Q | ThumbCoast Theatres | Runs Feb 8-March 9
ThumbCoast Theatres production of the Broadway hit, "Avenue Q" opens this weekend and runs through March 9th. Filled with gut-busting adult humor and a delightfully catchy score…not to mention puppets, this unique show addresses adult issues while spoofing the memory of educational television shows like “Sesame Street” and “The Electric Company.”
Music and Lyrics by: Robert Lopez, Jeff Marx
Book by: Jeff Whitty
Directed by: Joel Frazee
Music Direction by: Stephanie Graham
Choreography by: Lauren Riggs
KAIROS | Theatre Nova | Runs Feb 14-March 16
Theatre NOVA, Ann Arbor’s resident nonprofit professional theatre, is thrilled to present this National New Play Network Rolling World Premiere. This captivating love story opens on February 14 and runs through March 16, 2025. “Kairos” tells the story of Gina and David, whose relationship is upended by a groundbreaking medical procedure that grants immortality to a select few.
Written by: Lisa Sanaye Dring
Directed by: Briana O'Neal
OPENING THIS WEEKEND
SENSE & SENSIBILITY | The Encore Musical Theatre Co. | Runs Feb 27-March 16
The Encore Musical Theatre Company is proud to present the Michigan premiere of Sense & Sensibility, a romantic new chamber musical based on the novel by Jane Austen. Fresh from critical acclaim and multiple awards in Chicago, where it was lauded for its lush score and elegant storytelling, Sense & Sensibility brings Jane Austen’s timeless novel to life. Chicago critics hailed it as “mesmerizing” (Chicago Tribune) and “utterly charming” (Chicago Sun-Times), with the production earning accolades for its nuanced adaptation and emotional resonance.
Book, music, and lyrics by: Paul Gordon
Directed by: Matt Bogart
DETROIT SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
The Detroit Symphony Orchestra continues its 2024-25 season with a jam-packed February.
CLASSICAL ROOTS | Feb 28-March 1 | Acclaimed composer Jessie Montgomery is one of today’s “most distinctive and communicative voices” (BBC). Experience two of her recent masterpieces. Co-commissioned by the DSO, Snapshots brims with “glowing washes and surges of sound,” (Dallas Morning News). Her GRAMMY® Award-winning Rounds, played by virtuoso Awadagin Pratt, evokes imagery and themes from T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets. The program also includes a performance by the Brazeal Dennard Chorale and The Oak by Florence Price, plus a world premiere by award-winning Detroit trumpeter, composer, and educator Kris Johnson entitled Marlowe's Wings: Detroit's Champion of Change, which honors the memory of late community leader Marlowe Stoudamire.
SUBMISSIONS
2025 MICHIGAN PLAYWRIGHTS FESTIVAL | Theatre Nova | Deadline March 1
Theatre NOVA continues its semi-annual tradition, announcing a call for submissions for this season’s festival. Six new plays by Michigan playwrights will be selected for presentation in staged reading format September 10-14, 2025. The deadline for submissions is March 1, 2025 at 11:59pm. Theatre NOVA will announce selected plays in June.
The festival will feature full-length plays. The submitted play must be written by a Michigan resident, ready to be produced, but must not have received a prior full production.
Submission form: https://forms.gle/G4nGf8KL2LJ86hjW9.
For info and questions: theatrenovaplaysubmissions@gmail.com
COMING SOON
A DRIVING BEAT | Flint Repertory Theatre | Runs March 14-30
FIM Flint Repertory Theatre presents the world premiere production of A Driving Beat by Jordan Ramirez Puckett, March 14 - 30 at FIM Elgood Theatre.
Developed in Flint Rep’s 2023 New Works Festival, A Driving Beat follows Mateo, a 14-year-old boy with brown skin, and Diane, his white adoptive mother, on a road trip from their home in Ohio to his birthplace in San Diego. Throughout the journey, they are forced to reconcile their differing identities and what it means to be a family.
Written by: Jordan Ramirez Puckett
Directed by: Courtney Burkett
TWO DETROITS | Teen Hype | Runs March 13-14
Teen HYPE is thrilled to announce its highly anticipated 19th annual theatrical production, Two Detroits. This dynamic play, with music set against the backdrop of Detroit, with three performances March 13th and 14th.
Two Detroits is an innovative, high-energy production that invites audiences to reflect on the contrasting realities faced by young people in Detroit. Through compelling youth performances, this thought-provoking play delves into the tensions between privilege and adversity, exploring how the systems that separate us also reveal the common humanity that unites us.
Written by: Mallory Childs
Directed by: Henri Franklin
DOUBLE TAKES | Planet Ant Theatre | Runs March 7-22
Planet Ant Theatre presents Double Takes, a world premiere dark comedy brought to you by Michele Harte and the Planet Ant Farm Team.
Two crestfallen strangers find themselves in peculiar situations after they each have separate, unsuccessful suicide attempts. In a world where every time someone takes their own life, another dies too, they each realize that it could be best to form a suicide pact with someone else who craves death. After setting out to find the perfect person for their pacts, they find each other. Through devising the perfect plan to seal their fates, they form an unforeseen emotional connection.
Written & Directed by: Michele Harte
H.M.S. PINAFORE |Detroit Opera Youth Chorus | March 8
The Detroit Opera Youth Chorus (DOYC) will perform H.M.S. Pinafore, Gilbert & Sullivan’s classic comedic adventure of love that triumphs over all, at the Detroit Opera House on March 8 at 2:30pm. The production is suitable for all ages, and all roles in the opera will be performed by DOYC singers, who represent 40 different schools across the Metro Detroit area as well as Canada.
Libretto by: W.S. Gilbert
Music by: Sir Arthur Sullivan
Principal Chorus Conductor: Rebecca O-G Eaddy
ALIVIN AILEY AMERICAN DANCE THEATER | Detroit Opera | Runs March 14-16
Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater’s 2025 U.S. tour reaches Detroit March 14–16 during a season celebrating the life and legacy of Judith Jamison. The tour will feature four inspiring performances at the Detroit Opera House (March 14–16).
A Detroit highlight will be the 25th-anniversary staging of Ronald K. Brown’s Grace, depicting individuals on a journey to the promised land, bookended by Duke Ellington’s “Come Sunday.”
Ailey Experience Detroit workshops will be offered March 8 and 9 at Wayne State University’s Maggie Allesee Department of Theatre and Dance (4841 Cass Avenue) for dancers ages 11 and up (no dance experience required).
Visit https://ailey.org/series/ailey-experience-detroit for more information.
RIPCORD | Open Book Theatre | Runs March 14-April 6
Open Book Theatre Company in Trenton will ignite the stage March 14 through April 6 with a production that promises equal measures of riotous humor and genuine heart in Ripcord, a play by David Lindsay-Abaire.
The story follows prickly Abby, who is forced to share her room at Bristol Place Senior Living Facility with the sunny and chipper Marilyn. What begins as a seemingly harmless bet between the two quickly escalates into hilarious battles and a wild adventure that unveils unexpected depths and surprising friendships. The show features Connie Cowper and Linda Rabin Hammell as the warring roommates.
Written by: David Lindsay-Abaire
Directed by: Kevin T. Keller
COCK |The Ringwald Theatre | March 7-31
The Ringwald Theatre is proud to announce its production of Mike Bartlett’s seminal play Cock (aka The Cockfight Play), playing the Ferndale venue Fridays-Mondays from March 7-31, 2025.
John has been in a stable relationship with his boyfriend for several years. But when he takes a break, he accidentally falls in love with a woman.
Torn between the two, filled with guilt and conflicting emotions, he doesn’t know which way to turn.
Written by: Mike Bartlett
Directed by: Joey Bailey
AND THAT'S THE RUNDOWN! There is so much going on across the state, and WE KNOW this isn't a comprehensive list. So, if you think there's something we missed, please reach out.
Until Next Time. Break Legs!
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