2023-24 Season

Intimate Apparel

By Lynn Nottage

October 6 - October 15

A virtuous, hard-working woman, with a dream of saving enough money to open her own beauty parlor, Esther has kept her nose to the grindstone for eighteen years, but ends up feeling as if life is passing her by. Romance beckons in the form of George Armstrong, a stranger who writes to her from his work on the Panama Canal, and Esther finds herself falling for his poetic words, even though her friends warn her against his sweet talk, and even though she herself is unable to read or write, and must ask for help to compose her own letters in reply. After George arrives in New York City, and after they are married, Esther discovers that she is not the only one who misrepresented herself during their correspondence courtship, and that she is now in danger of heartbreak. Warm, intelligent, and deeply human, Lynn Nottage’s Intimate Apparel explores the desire for both independence and connection, the insidious effects of racism and classism, the social oppression of women, and the bravery, hard work, friendship, and love, of people who have been forgotten by history.

Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812

By Dave Malloy

Adapted from War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

October 27 - November 5

From the celebrated and award-winning composer Dave Malloy comes Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, an electropop opera based on a scandalous slice of Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace. Young and impulsive, Natasha Rostova arrives in Moscow to await the return of her fiancé from the front lines. When she falls under the spell of the roguish Anatole, it is up to Pierre, a family friend in the middle of an existential crisis, to pick up the pieces of her shattered reputation. Following a critically exalted premiere at Ars Nova in New York City, a subsequent Off-Broadway transfer, and an acclaimed run on Broadway, this award-winning musical expands the possibilities for the genre with its daring score and bold storytelling.  

Clue

Clue is adapted from the screenplay by Jonathan Lynn

Written by Sandy Rustin

Additional material by Hunter Foster and Eric Price

Original music composed by Michael Holland

Based on the Paramount Pictures Motion Picture based on the Hasbro board game CLUE

November 10 - November 19

Based on the iconic 1985 Paramount movie which was inspired by the classic Hasbro board game, Clue is a hilarious farce-meets-murder mystery. The tale begins at a remote mansion, where six mysterious guests assemble for an unusual dinner party where murder and blackmail are on the menu. When their host turns up dead, they all become suspects. Led by Wadsworth–the butler, Miss Scarlett, Professor Plum, Mrs. White, Mr. Green, Mrs. Peacock and Colonel Mustard race to find the killer as the body count stacks up. Clue is the comedy whodunit that will leave both cult-fans and newcomers in stitches as they try to figure out…WHO did it, WHERE, and with WHAT! 

Next Stop, Broadway!

November 30 - December 2

Our annual cabaret event featuring WMU seniors and a special guest star!

More Fun Than Bowling

By Steven Dietz

February 2 - February 11

Jake owns a bowling alley in a small Midwestern town. He is sitting on a hilltop where two of his three wives are buried. Lois was zapped by lightning while carrying a bowling trophy in a thunderstorm and Loretta was killed by a ball return machine where he comes to ruminate. In his younger days he was a promising concert musician but a foul tip baseball broke his fingers which subsequently healed into a perfect bowler's grip. Jake replays the key frames of his life and, from time to time, is visited by his daughter Molly who has become adept at talking women into marrying her father for love and free lane time. But who is that nattily dressed man with dark glasses and a revolver lurking nearby? 

Argonautika

By Mary Zimmerman

March 15 - March 24

As in her Tony Award–winning Metamorphoses, Mary Zimmerman transforms Greek mythology—here the story of Jason and the Argonauts—into a mesmerizing piece of theater. Encountering an array of daunting challenges in their “first voyage of the world,” Jason and his crew illus­trate the essence of all such journeys to follow—their un­predictability, their inspiring and overwhelming breadth of emotion, their lessons in the inevitability of failure and loss. Bursts of humor and fantastical creatures enrich a story whose characters reveal remarkable complexity. Medea is profoundly sympathetic even as the seeds are sown for the monstrous life ahead of her, and the brute strength of Hercules leaves him no less vulnerable to the vicissitudes of love. Zimmerman brings to Argonautika her trademark ability to encompass the full range of human experience in a work as entertaining as it is enlightening. 

 

Spongebob Squarepants

Based on the series by Stephen Hillenburg

Book by Kyle Jarrow

Musical Production Conceived by Tina Landau

April 5 - April 14

Plunge into this stunning all-singing, all-dancing, dynamic stage show! When the citizens of Bikini Bottom discover that a volcano will soon erupt and destroy their humble home, SpongeBob and his friends must come together to save the fate of their undersea world. With lives hanging in the balance and all hope lost, a most unexpected hero rises up. The power of optimism really can save the world! 

Julius Caesar

By William Shakespeare

May 17 - May 26

Shakespeare's political thriller tells the story of the conspiracy against Caesar, his assassination and the defeat of his conspirators.  Jealous conspirators convince Caesar's friend Brutus to join their assassination plot against Caesar. To stop Caesar from gaining too much power, Brutus and the conspirators kill him on the Ides of March. Mark Antony drives the conspirators out of Rome and fights them in a battle. Brutus and his friend Cassius lose and kill themselves, leaving Antony to rule in Rome.