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Sunday, February 03, 2019

February 2019 Theater Openings



Diana Huey and Galen Disston in Rock of Ages (Mark Kitaoka)
A big musical, two different takes on Uncle Vanya, and a lot more is in store for your February theater-going pleasure. Check out what’s coming up!


Rock of Ages, 5th Avenue Theatre, 2/1-24/19 (opens 2/8)
Diana Huey comes back to town to headline this ‘80s rock ‘n’ roll homage. It’s the story of a small town girl and a city boy who meet on the Sunset Strip while pursuing their Hollywood dreams. Their rocking romance is told through the heart-pounding hits of Styx, Foreigner, Joan Jett, REO Speedwagon, Pat Benatar, Twisted Sister and more.


The Devil and Sarah Blackwater, Annex Theatre, 2/1/19-3/2/19 (world premiere)
Singer-songwriter Sarah Blackwater’s rock and roll tour is rudely interrupted when the Devil comes calling about a debt - the eternal soul of her partner, Sam. With love as her compass, Sarah goes through hell and back to discover what’s worth holding on to.


Uncle Vanya, The Seagull Project, 2/1-17/19 (at ACT Theatre)
Uncle Vanya is the second major play written by Anton Chekhov and premiered at the Moscow Art Theatre in 1898. A provincial family is in turmoil, after the esteemed Professor Serebryakov and his wife, Yelena, arrive to stay at the family estate after coming to the end of their fiscal rope. The desires of the family begin to boil under these new circumstances.
 
It Could Be Any One of Us, Phoenix Theatre, 2/1-24/19
In a windswept country house, a family of artistic failures wrangles over a will. A detective who has never solved a case, a writer whose works have never been published, an artist who’s never shown a painting, a composer whose compositions have never been performed, and a dysfunctional teenager are the prime ingredients for this murder mystery. The victim, however, is not who it should be, and the murderer’s identity changes overnight. Alan Ayckbourn wrote this play with multiple endings. The Phoenix’s production will surprise the audience with a different ending each night, determined by a card game on stage that steers the actors in any given direction.
www.tptedmonds.org


I and You, Penguin Productions, 2/2-9/19 (at Taproot Theatre)
Housebound because of illness, Caroline hasn’t been to school in months. Confined to her room, she has only Instagram and Facebook for company. That is until classmate Toni bursts in – uninvited and armed with waffle fries, a scruffy copy of Walt Whitman’s poetry, and a school project due in the next day. An unlikely friendship develops and a seemingly mundane piece of homework explodes into a journey of discovery about art, connection, and identity. 


140 LBS, STG Presents, 2/7-17/19 (at Theatre Off Jackson) (world premiere)
Susan Lieu performs a solo piece. Susan’s mother loses oxygen to her brain during surgery and the plastic surgeon deliberately does not call 9-1-1 for fourteen minutes. Five days later, she flatlines. The surgeon is charged with medical negligence and her family falls apart; no one talks about what happened. Nineteen years later, on her wedding day, Susan’s mother’s chair sits empty and Susan realizes she can no longer ignore what she’s always wanted: to know who her mother was. Sifting through thousands of deposition pages and reaching out to the killer’s family, Susan uncovers the painful truth of her mother, herself, and the impossible ideal of Vietnamese feminine beauty. 


Aida, Seattle Musical Theatre, 2/8-24/19
Elton John and Tim Rice’s Aida is a timeless love story, featuring an award-winning score from the seasoned duo. This musical features stylistically eclectic songs from reggae, gospel, Motown, African, Indian, and Middle Eastern influences, to Elton John’s characteristic pop style. 


Alien/Angel, Cafe Nordo, 2/8-24/19
Writer/Performer Devin Bannon bring to life historical TV interviews of the actual Klaus Sperber, while reimagining the musical acts of his rock alter ego Nomi in nine soaring numbers. In between the songs, Bannon-as-Klaus tells a moving narrative of his life as a young, queer German gifted with a soprano vocal range, who moved to Manhattan in the 1980’s with a generation of youth inspired by Andy Warhol’s Factory. Klaus tells the tale of his brush with fame and all-too-young death as one of the first celebrity victims of the AIDS epidemic. Known as the weirdo’s weirdo, starving artist Klaus was famous for trading his homemade pastries in exchange for studio time and rehearsal space to create music that became inspiration for artists like David Bowie and Joey Arias. A four course menu of pies, savory and sweet, is included in the ticket price. 


The Clean House, As If Theatre Company, 2/8-24/19 (at Kenmore Community Club)
Lane, a doctor, values order in every aspect of her life – her career, her house, her emotions, her relationships. Her live-in Brazilian maid, Matilde, finds cleaning makes her sad and yearns to be a stand-up comedian. Lane’s sister, Virginia, finds solace in cleaning and secretly takes over Matilde’s duties. When Lane’s surgeon husband falls in love with a terminally-ill patient, everything is thrown into disarray, and Lane must turn to the women in her life to help sort out the mess. Blending whimsical humor with wisdom and compassion, this romantic comedy about love, sex, death – and finding the perfect joke – proves that shared laughter can heal almost anything.
www.asiftheatre.com (Kenmore Community Club: 7304 NE 175th St, Kenmore)


American Junkie, Book-It Repertory Theatre, 2/14/19-3/10/19 (opens 2/16) (world premiere)
How does a budding musician become a broken-down junkie? With a brutally honest look at addiction during Seattle’s grunge years, author Tom Hansen, a pioneer in Seattle’s punk rock scene, charts his path as he goes from rock bottom to recovery, without self-pity or blame. Hansen balances a raw story about vulnerability and the pain that inspires self-destruction with humor and hope.


Raisins in a Glass of Milk 2019, Live Girls! Theater, 2/14-17/19 (at Taproot Theatre)
Raisins in a Glass of Milk 2019 is the first in an annual series simply known as Raisins. The Raisins Team will continue conducting new interviews to weave them into an original play to be produced every February. Raisins 2019 was generated from candid interviews of artists of color around the country and then crafted into six multidimensional women. These women of color will be confronted with the question: “How can we dismantle white supremacy in the American theater?” They will walk to the edge of what is civil to find what is right.


The Passage, Village Theatre BETA Series Presentation, 2/15-24/19
Monsters lurking. Beasts to fear. And a father in danger. The Passage is an inventive and surprisingly humorous new musical that is as captivating as it is unflinchingly honest. Do you have the courage to venture below? After all, it’s just a basement... The BETA Series is a developmental step that gives musical writers the chance to see their work fully realized while it is still in progress.


Uncle Vanya, Theatre9/12, 2/15/19-3/10/19
This iteration of Uncle Vanya is a modern adaptation by the renowned playwright Annie Baker. The unusual circumstance of two productions of the same play in the same month may give audiences a unique opportunity to experience the magic of live theater and how different each production will likely prove to be.


Fantastic.Z’s 7th Annual New Works Festival, 2/15-23/19 (at 18th & Union)
It's Only Kickball, Stupid, by Caroline Prugh, is a bittersweet comedy about that first crush. B-Sides is a staged reading of 5 short LGBTQ plays.


The Woman in Black, Seattle Repertory Theatre, 2/22/19-3/24/19
In the village of Crythin Gifford, the wind howls across the moors and fog creeps mysteriously around the town spires. At the edge of the village's cemetery, young lawyer Arthur Kipps glimpses the figure of a woman, garbed all in black, and is drawn into Crythin's cursed and haunted history. Susan Hill's gothic ghost story, The Woman in Black, comes to spine-tingling life in this cunning stage adaptation that left London's West End theatregoers enthralled.

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