Madison stages are drawing dramatic inspiration from real people and events this season. LeBron James, Nat Turner, the Collyer brothers, and Wisconsin native and accordion player Ruth Marty all take center stage this fall in works from Forward Theater, American Players Theatre, Madison Public Theatre and Four Seasons Theatre. Real threats are also front and center: The AIDS crisis, homophobic violence, and the destruction of earth by a comet drive the plots in works from University Theatre, StageQ and Madison Shakespeare Company. But don’t worry, there are also comedies. We promise.
King James
September 12-29, Overture-Playhouse
Playwright Rajiv Joseph’s King James was originally produced at Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theater in 2022; this is its Wisconsin premiere. Two Cleveland Cavaliers fans meet in a classic sport transaction: one has tickets he wants to sell, the other needs tickets for the team’s first season with LeBron James. It’s a comedy about fandom, friendship and loyalty. The play stars Marques Causey as Shawn and Greg Pregel as Matt.
Angels in America Part I: Millennium Approaches
Sept. 12-22, UW Vilas Hall-Hemsley Theatre
Possibly the definitive American play of the early 1990s, Tony Kushner’s Angels in America has won just about every award given. Set in the early days of the AIDS epidemic in New York City and elsewhere, the plot weaves real people with fictional figures; eight actors double up on roles. Characters include the real life lawyer Roy Cohn, a Mormon housewife, gay men with AIDS and their families, even Ethel Rosenberg. Although three decades have passed since it was penned, the political and social themes in the play are still relevant and even newly reinvigorated. In addition, a staged reading of Angels in America Part 2: Perestroika will run Sept. 18-22 in the Mitchell Theatre.
Found Money: The Musical
Sept. 20-28, Mary Dupont Wahlers Theatre
Encore’s Kelsy Schoenhaar wrote the book and music to this “new adaptation of an Encore favorite.” Ryan, a person with a disability, mistakenly receives more money than usual in his benefits check. He might lose the much needed funds — and get into more trouble — when he tells the wrong person about this windfall. Encore is a professional company for people with disabilities, one of the few in the U.S.
The God Cluster: A Queer Pandemic Revenge Tragedy
Oct. 4-26, Broom Street Theater
An intimate play set in a vaccine lab during “the next” pandemic. Mortality, medicine and love are front and center in this timely and thought provoking play by Ernie Lijoi.
The Untold Story of the Collyer Brothers
Oct. 11-26, Bartell Theatre
This is the first show for the new Madison Public Theatre (formerly Strollers Theatre), co-produced by Oracular Studios. The told part of the untold story is that the Collyer brothers, Homer and Langley, are hoarders living in a junk-laden, boobytrapped brownstone in 1930s Harlem. The play, written and directed by Madison’s Finn Gallagher, takes off from this intriguing true story.
Diary of a Wimpy Kid
Oct. 12-27, MYArts-Starlight
The beloved book series is transformed into a musical with the kid-friendly running time of 60 minutes. The play, intended for ages 8 and up, centers on Greg, a middle-schooler, and his struggles with making friends. The script helps kids deal with themes like choices and belonging.
American Players Theatre
Oct. 17-Nov. 10, APT-Touchstone, Spring Green
Nat Turner famously led an uprising of the enslaved that was one of the sparks for the Civil War. Here playwright Nathan Alan Davis draws from a document written by lawyer Thomas R. Gray from a conversation with Turner in his jail cell the night before he is to be executed in Jerusalem, Virginia. This serious, tense, still work should be in good hands with James DeVita and Gavin Lawrence.
Swissconsin
Oct. 18, Overture Center-Playhouse
This production spotlights real life Wisconsinite Ruth Marty, the daughter of Swiss immigrants (and grandmother to Four Seasons artistic director Sarah Marty), who grew up singing folk songs while helping her father, a cheesemaker, and playing accordion. The performance includes a talk by UW-Madison professor James Leary of the Down Home Dairyland history recording project.
The Magical Forest
Children’s Theater of Madison
Oct. 19-27, MYArts-Sunrise
A mouse party in the forest for young theatergoers ages 2-5 features Mutzie the Mouse and friend Grumpy the Troll. Expect fun, play, and audience participation.
Sirena
Four Seasons Theatre
Oct. 20, Overture Center-Playhouse
An original story conceived by Mineral Point-based Filipina artist Leslie Damaso, Sirena features new compositions and contemporary arrangements of kundiman songs of love and freedom. Sirena blends a personal story, family secrets, a mythic love triangle ending in the beginning of a nation, the displacement of its people, and an individual’s search for identity and belonging. Post-show talkback with Leslie Damaso.
For the Love of (Or the Roller Derby Play)
Madison College Performing Arts
Oct. 18-27, Madison College-Truax
Studio Theater
Playwright Gina Femia has written 10 plays and a young adult novel, reflecting themes of friendship, family, queer lives, pride and love. Here the scene is an unexpected roller derby romance; the play features an all-female cast.
No Regrets
Oct. 26-27, Arts + Literature Laboratory
Albert Camus and Edith Piaf in the French Resistance. It will be an evening of Piaf’s classic songs and Camus’ writing for the underground newspaper Combat.
The Blue Comet
Nov. 1-9, Bartell Theatre
This forgotten comedy by Eden Phillpotts was performed in England in the 1920s, but never produced in the United States. A sci-fi comedy of manners, it centers on an English country family who is grappling with two potential catastrophes: the arrival of the comet — and a relative from Australia.
Angry F*GS
Nov. 1-16, Bartell Theatre
StageQ weighs in with a smartly timed election play. Topher Payne’s Angry F*GS, written in 2013, deals with violence and attitudes that have not changed in the 11 years since. When a friend is beaten up outside a gay bar, political speechwriter Bennett is outraged that it isn’t classified as a hate crime. This dark revenge comedy won the Gene-Gabriel Moore playwriting award.
Murder Girl
Forward Theater
Nov. 7-24, Overture-Playhouse
This is the world premiere of a new play by Milwaukee actor/playwright Heidi Armbruster, who often draws from classic murder mysteries and has previously adapted Agatha Christie’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd for the stage as well as crafting Mrs. Christie, a play about the novelist. In this comedy, Armbruster draws on the fact that Wisconsin is populated with both supper clubs and famous serial killers. The plot: Siblings who have inherited a supper club in the northwoods find things turning dark. American Players Theatre favorite Sarah Day is in the cast.
Are We Dell’Arte
Nov. 7-16, Broom Street Theater
The ensemble that puts together its shows in just two weeks from script to production tackles the age-old form of commedia dell’arte, one of the earliest forms of professional theater.
Pride and Prejudice
University Theatre
Nov. 7-17, UW Vilas Hall-Mitchell Theatre
It’s one of the most beloved novels in English for a reason. Our heroine, Elizabeth Bennet, is ahead of her time. When she decides that the eligible Mr. Darcy is an insufferable snob, she must learn much before everything comes to right. While P and P is in many ways an intricate dance in which the major characters figure out who should marry whom, it is much more than that, assaying class and gender roles with wit and perception.
Consider the Consequences! An Interactive Gamebook of Life
Falconbridge Players
Nov. 12, Arts + Literature Laboratory
The Choose Your Own Adventure books were long predated by Mary Alden Hopkins and Doris Webster’s 1930 interactive novel Consider the Consequences! Falconbridge Players continues its run of dramatic readings of forgotten works that have recently come out of copyright. Audience members vote on the fate of each character at various points in the script.
It’s a Wonderful Life: A New Musical
Nov. 22-Dec. 1. Madison College-Truax
Mitby Theater
This new musical by Andrew Abrams and John Atkins reimagines the classic Christmas film with Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed. The score takes a fresh approach to the era.
Scooby-Doo! And a Panto, Too! Mercury Players Theatre
Dec. 13-28, Bartell Theatre
Localizing the cartoon crime solvers, Mercury sets the story of the mysterious phantom in none other than the Bartell Theater. Will Scooby and friends solve the mystery?
