I always enjoy seeing new works by promising playwrights. It’s really exciting to attend a “world premiere” of a brand new work. As an audience member, I feel that I’ve been invited to share in something very exciting and special.

Neighborhood Theatre Group, Ypsilanti’s new theater company, unveils two original one-act plays this weekend. Both of these new works center on relationships and both are by local playwright, Ypsilanti resident and Neighborhood Theatre co-founder A.M. Dean.

The Former Things, directed by Marisa Dluge, tells the story of a couple who are reunited after many years. Uniquely set during the rapture, this one-act features Eric Hohnke, Mimi Keebler, and Tom Hett.

A teenage boy meets a local girl as he vacations up north for the summer in Carl, Baby. An obstacle to their happiness may be his unstoppable and forceful grandmother. Directed by Kristin Anne Danko, this one-act features Neel Vaidya, Alice Duhon, and Colleen Cartwright.

So, why not experience something new this weekend? Neighborhood Theatre Group intends to cultivate a welcoming, collaborative environment for local theatre artists and also provide the audience with a very unique and intimate theatre experience.

Tim Grimes is manager of Community Relations & Marketing at the Ann Arbor District Library and co-founder of Redbud Productions.

Performances of The Former Things and Carl, Baby run from Thursday, September 15 through Saturday, September 17 at Dreamland Theater, 26 N. Washington St. in Downtown Ypsilanti. All shows are at 8 pm. For tickets, visit http://ntgoneacts.brownpapertickets.com. For more information, email neighborhoodtheatregroup@gmail.com.

Oh those middle school years, we remember them well. The humiliation, the anxiety, the bullies, the stress, the dire need to be good at something, what a wonderful time it was.

The Ann Arbor Civic Theatre is presenting a happy bit of nostalgia with The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, a musical salute to all those anxiety-ridden kids who strived to be top speller.

The Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre on the central University of Michigan campus is a perfect setting. The stage is simply decorated with a banner for the spelling bee, sponsored by the county optometrists, a riser of bleacher seats, a microphone and a table for the two adult hosts.

Spelling Bee takes a quirky, exaggerated look at some gawky budding adolescents and plays it for laughs that lead to some empathy and respect for the troubled young people who often get noticed for all the wrong reasons in school. Director Wendy Sielaff has brought together a fine cast that ham it up hilariously while also delivering the goods when called on to go deeper into character.

The music by William Finn is serviceable but the lyrics are used to convey those deeper feelings, while Rachel Sheinkin’s Tony-winning book richly skewers school life, spelling bees, and the cluelessness of adults.

We know the types. Here they are played not by middle-school-aged children but by older actors in reflection of those trying years.

Emily Fishman is sweet and appropriately apprehensive at Olive, dressed in an innocent pink jumper. Olive is torn between two neglectful parents and wants to finally get their attention. Fishman has a ringing voice, especially effective in "The I Love You" trio with her parents.

Nathan King is the goofy Leaf Coneybear, the non-achieving younger brother who gets no respect at home. But then again he dresses weirdly and shouts a lot. King brings a touch of Jerry Lewis to Coneybear but also some sweet pathos to "I’m Not That Smart."

Keshia Daisy Oliver is Logainne, the daughter of two gay fathers who want her to succeed a little too fervently. Oliver also finds the spot of empathy and a sweet moment of rebellion.

Bob Cox plays Chip, a boy moving into manhood at just the wrong time. Cox is dressed as a Boy Scout with too many merit badges. He is especially funny in "Chip’s Lament," a ditty about the betrayal of puberty.

Hallie Fox is Marcy, the over-achiever, the success-obsessed Catholic schoolgirl who sums up her anxiety with the song "I Speak Six Languages." Fox gives the character that determined to demented look and snappish voice of a future politician.

Finally, we come to the most outlandish contestant, Barfee (or as he insist, it’s pronounced Barfay). Connor Rhoades goes all out in his wrinkled white shirt, tie and shorts. Barfee is a big boy and the ultimate nerd who uses his foot to help him spell. Rhoades is a giant presence throughout but takes center stage with the "Magic Foot" number. He makes Barfee both anxiety ridden, pathetic, and strangely likeable. Rhoades also plays one of Logainne’s Dads (think Modern Family, here).

The other contestants are played (filled?) by good sports selected from the audience, who on Thursday provided some gentle laughs of their own.

The adult roles are also well played. Alison Ackerman is Rona, the teacher who never got over her success at the Bee. She is every bit the prim but enthusiastic teacher who misses the limelight. Ackerman also plays Olive’s absent in India mother in the "Love Song" trio.

Brandon Cave is excellent as the droll assistant principal Doug Panch who gives the spellers their words and much more. He gets some of the shows wittiest lines and he delivers them with low-key panache.

Finally, we have Nick Rapson as the coach who fills in as the sympathetic comforter of the “losers,” and he has just the right amount of sweet toughness and skepticism about the whole process. Thursday he had some humorous improvisation during his "Prayer of the Comfort Counselor" spotlight and made it special. Rapson also plays Olive’s Dad in the "Love Song" trio and is a hoot as Logainne’s other Dad.

Musical accompaniment by an on-stage five-piece band under the direction of Debra Nichols is solid, especially on some of the humorous percussion moments. Reilly Conlon brings the right clumsy humor and daffiness to the choreography.

Sielaff says this play has long been on her bucket list and now she can check it off as a success. She mines both the outsize humor and the quiet empathy that has make this a popular production across the country.

Hugh Gallagher has written theater and film reviews over a 40-year newspaper career and was most recently managing editor of the Observer & Eccentric Newspapers in suburban Detroit.

The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee continues at 8 pm Friday and Saturday and 2 pm Sunday at the Mendelssohn. For tickets and information, go online to http://www.a2ct.org, call (734) 971-2228, or purchase at the theatre before each performance.

While watching Theatre Nova’s lovely new production of Sarah Ruhl’s play, Dear Elizabeth, drawn from 30 years of correspondence between poets Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell, the phrase “alone together” comes to mind often.

Why? Because although they both experience love off-stage – Bishop with a woman in Brazil named Lota, Lowell with three different wives – their true first love is words; and like a jealous, possessive lover, words, when you’re a professional writer, demand that you spend most of your waking life alone with them, and only them.

So it’s not surprising that Lowell and Bishop – who lived a similarly isolated artistic existence, and consequently understood each other deeply – flung letters to each other as if they were life preservers.

In life, Lowell and Bishop wrote more than 800 letters to each other, offering praise and feedback for each other’s work; celebrating each others’ awards and personal victories; and chronicling their travels, as well as their battles with inner demons (Bishop’s depression and alcoholism, Lowell’s bipolar disorder). Not surprisingly, even the prose of their casual letters rings gorgeously poetic; in reference to a lighted swimming pool, Bishop wrote, “it is wonderful to swim around in a sort of green fire. One’s friends look like luminous frogs.”

The inherent challenge of an epistolary play, of course, involves giving the audience something to watch, not simply listen to. Ruhl lays the foundation for a visually satisfying production by way of stage directions, calling for occasional projections, and giving the actors a template for connecting scenes through actions; they also “live” certain quirky moments as they speak the words of their letters instead of pretending to write them.

But director David Wolber gets much credit, too, for adding his own creative touches, effectively using props, different areas of the set, and a movement pattern for the actors – partly inspired by Lowell’s frustrated observation that the two poets seem connected by a wire, so that when one moves, the other does as well – that keeps the audience engaged.

Another tricky prospect, however, involves how to present the poets in their moments of weakness, such as when Bishop pulls two filled wine glasses from her desk to drink. It’s initially funny, but when she then pulls out a bottle of rubbing alcohol and downs that, too, we know we’ve suddenly gone down the rabbit hole of addiction. Wolber and actress Carrie Jay Sayer handle the shift with sensitivity, not playing it too heavily or too lightly, but rather suggesting a haunting, all-too-natural progression into darkness. (Wolber specializes in plays about artists and the process of creation, so play and director are ideally matched here.)

Joel Mitchell is marvelous and heartbreaking as Lowell, a man who struggles mightily in his own life, and uses that as material for his confessional poetry. Sayer, meanwhile, is well-cast as Bishop, conveying the emotionally guarded poet’s simultaneous desire to connect to Lowell while also always maintaining an arm’s length distance; and the actress nails a running gag wherein, after showering Lowell with praise over a poem or collection, she pauses and says something like, “There are just three words I take objection to,” or “I have two minor questions.”

Similarly, Lowell critiques his letter-writing in a postscript – “The last part is too heatedly written, with too many ‘ands’ and so forth” – thus providing a glimpse of the writer’s particular brand of neurosis. But this telling moment also suggests why he and Bishop never find happiness for long: they each can’t stop trying to edit their own lives.

Carla Milarch designed the show’s sound (including key exterior noises), as well as its costumes (Mitchell pulls different jackets and sweaters from a coat stand on stage). And Daniel C. Walker designed the show’s lighting and set, with adjacent workspaces for each poet, a ladder upstage center, and a large, short rock downstage right.

Indeed, in Dear Elizabeth, the rock marks the spot where Lowell and Bishop spent time together on a beach one day in Maine, early in their friendship. In a rush of feeling, Lowell nearly proposed to Bishop there, and he later confessed this to Bishop, writing, “asking you is the might have been for me, the one towering change, the other life that might have been had.”

Though this is a beautiful, emotionally powerful admission to make, Dear Elizabeth makes you realize that in Bishop and Lowell’s case, Lowell’s failure to propose likely resulted in the pair having the most satisfying and durable kind of marriage they could ever hope to share with each other.

Jenn McKee is a former staff arts reporter for The Ann Arbor News, where she primarily covered theater and film events, and also wrote general features and occasional articles on books and music.

Dear Elizabeth runs through Sunday, September 25, at the Yellow Barn, 410 West Huron, Ann Arbor, MI, 48103. Call 734-635-8450 or visit Theatre Nova for tickets.

Variety shows were a huge part of my childhood - Sonny & Cher, Sha Na Na, even Lawrence Welk - I especially loved Welk’s accordions, although the rest of my family gently teased me about this. These were the shows that we watched in my family. They offered enough variety (as the name promises) to entertain my Silent Generation grandparents, Baby Boomer parents, and a young me. Thus, it was an absolute pleasure to see a live variety show at the Ann Arbor Civic Theater this past Saturday!

WordFest One: A Spoken Word Variety Show was the brainchild of Lyn Davidge. Davidge says she made her stage debut at age 61 with six lines in an Ann Arbor Civic Theater play. She then met other actors and playwrights, and became fascinated with “how all the spoken art forms complement and contrast with each other, and how different artists had different ‘takes’ on their particular art form.” Conversations with her fellow artists inspired Davidge to put on an independent show. “My wish to do a variety show just evolved. I had time this summer, and just decided to do it!” Davidge said.

The sold-out event began with a charming story from Davidge, about her grandfather who made and sold rat poison all around the greater Midwest. Poet and storyteller Bob Brill followed up with a “flash fiction” (a story less than 1,000 words) story about a dying man who revisits some key moments of his life. Bob’s genuine, authentic voice gave so much to this story that I really began to believe that the man ran off to chase the moon with his five-year old self.

The last act in the first half was the reading of an original play by Glen Modell called Death of a Poet. This play also dealt with death, but in such a way that I felt hopeful and full of life. An elderly poet is finishing a poem and needs just a little bit of help, which comes in the forms of the human embodiments of other poems he has written throughout his lifetime. They—and the millions of other poems written throughout history—are all waiting for him once he finished that last line. Performers included Dave Keren, Glen Modell, Sanders Hamson, Susan Klein, Lorelle Otis, Jean Leverich, and Marilyn Scott.

The second half opened with stand-up comedy by improv actor Andy Jentzen. If you know Andy, then you know there were plenty of Santa Claus jokes mixed in. Next was a monologue written by Lori Reece and performed by Jean Leverich. This poignant and witty piece, Professor Parker on Pot, dealt with a professor whose first experience with marijuana coincided with her terminal illness. Lastly, the revue featured a play by Steve Daut, a riff on our reality show obsessed society that asked “so, who wants to elect a president?” The humorous one-act featured Don Pardo, played by Andy Jentzen, Bill Rodman, played by Dave Keren, Penny Salin played by Susan Klein, Clio Hill played by Lorelle Otis, and the narrator played by Sanders Hamson. We eventually got a president, but there were some fun twists and turns along the way!

WordFest One was a great way to spend a rainy Saturday afternoon, just like the way I used to watch Lawrence Welk every weekend—and not an accordion in sight!

Patti Smith is a special education teacher who lives in Ann Arbor with her husband and cats. She is the author of two books about Ann Arbor, the most recent is a history of the People’s Food Co-op. Visit her at www.PattiFSmith.com or @TeacherPatti on Twitter.

The overture is about to start
You cross your fingers and hold your heart
It’s curtain time and away we go –
Another opening of another show
~ Cole Porter

Autumn is just around the corner, school is back in session or soon will be, and another vibrant theater season in about to raise curtains all over Washtenaw County.

One of the perks of living here is access to so much great performing arts, from small jazz, folk and rock venues to huge arenas reverberating with mega amps and stomping fans; from intimate chamber recitals to resounding symphonies by the greatest musicians in the world; to quality professional and non-professional theater that ranges from challenging and experimental to comforting and familiar.

The theater season is especially noteworthy for the variety offered, something for every taste and numerous opportunities for sampling something that you might not think is to your taste until you try it. Two state universities, several professional and non-professional theater groups, and dramatic offerings by the outstanding University Musical Society make for a full menu of promising theater.

The Ann Arbor Civic Theatre continues a tradition that dates back to 1929 when it launches its new season with the musical comedy The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Sept. 8 at the Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre on the University of Michigan Campus. It soon shifts gears from this light-hearted musical comedy for its second offering of the season, William Shakespeare’s Othello.

“We are a director driven company and have a director driven process,” said Alexandra Berneis, executive director of the AACT. “The directors come in with a play of musical in mind and a summary of ideas.”

The process for the next season begins in October. A committee of seven winnows through as many as 30 proposals, invites directors to come in to share their visions for the productions they’ve proposed, and narrows it down to a diverse season of plays.

“Usually, we end up with three musicals and three plays, but this season we had more play suggestions and we have four plays and two musicals,” Berneis said.

As a volunteer, non-professional theater, AACT tries to provide a wide range of opportunities for actors and production crew.

“We ask for plays to have at least six characters because of the venues we are working in and to involve as many people as possible,” Berneis said.

For smaller, more intimate and more experimental works, AACT created a Second Stage program for its small stage at its office at 322 Ann St.

The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee will be presented Sept. 8-11 at the Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre on the main campus of the University of Michigan. A middle school spelling bee is the scene for a light-hearted look at childhood angst with adults playing the children.

Othello will be presented Oct. 27-30 at the Arthur Miller Theatre on the UM north campus. Shakespeare’s tragedy deals with complex themes of racial tensions, jealousy, deception, and stifled emotions.

In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play will be presented Jan. 12-15 at the Miller Theatre. Sarah Ruhl’s Tony-nominated play about the 19th century invention of the vibrator to ease “female anxiety” deals sensitively with various aspects of a woman’s life.

Almost, Maine, nine stories set in a small town in Maine, will be presented March 9-12 at the Miller Theatre.

Morning’s at Seven is a drama about four sisters in a small town during the 1930s. It will be presented April 20-23 at the Miller Theatre.

The Mystery of Edwin Drood is a musical based on Charles Dickens unfinished novel in which the audience helps solve the mystery. It will be presented June 1-4 at the Mendelssohn Theatre.

Second Stage productions are Sylvia, Sept. 30 to Oct. 2 and Criminal Hearts, June 16-18.

Order tickets at http://www.A2ct.org or by phone at (734) 971-2228.

The Purple Rose Theatre Company in Chelsea opens its 26th season of professional theater on Sept. 29. The season features the world premiere of two comedies by Michigan writers, a revival and a Pulitzer-Prize winning American classic.

Artistic director Guy Sanville said the Purple Rose doesn’t usually build a season around a particular theme.

“But I would say this is a season about second chances, and we’ve always been drawn to that,” he said.

The Purple Rose is about developing new talent and introducing new plays.

“We’re constantly developing new work, it’s a key component of our mission,” he said. “This will be our 65th or 66th world premiere, at least half of our plays.”

He said the company currently has eight plays in development and that it sometimes takes years to develop a production.

“We have a group of playwrights we work with - Carey Crim, (Purple Rose founder) Jeff Daniels, Matt Letsher and Brian Letscher. We’re always interested in what they’re doing,” Sanville said.

Carey Crim was asked to write this season’s first play with a couple of actors in mind for a romantic comedy about retired people.

Sanville, managing director Katie Doral, and others read the plays submitted, but the final choice is made by Jeff Daniels from their suggestions.

“He’s never turned anything down,” Sanville said.

“You read something and think hmm, this has possibilities. It might be a great speech or one great scene but you know the person can write,” Sanville said.

Purple Rose works with writers through its Greenhouse Workshops at the Chelsea Library to develop their talents. Sanville said the 2017-18 season is already in development.

Morning After Grace by Carey Crim has its world premiere Sept. 29 and runs through Dec 17. The comedy tells the story of Angus and Abigail, who meet at a wedding and wake up together after a wine-fueled night. The cast includes Randolph Mantooth, who many may remember as a regular on the TV series Emergency.

Smart Love by Brian Letscher is the other comedy having a world premiere. This “dark comedy” with some sci-fi elements is about a brilliant young man who struggles with his father’s sudden death and the revelation that his parents’ marriage wasn’t everything he was led to believe. The play explores the implications of artificial intelligence. The play opens Jan. 19 and runs through March 4.

The revival is Vino Veritas by David Macgregor. On Halloween night two couples prepare to attend an annual costume party. Their evening unravels after they share a bottle of South American ceremonial wine. The play opens March 23 and runs through May 27.

The season ends with the classic Harvey by Mary Chase. The award-winning play concerns one Elwood P. Dowd and his pooka companion, Harvey, a six-and-a-half-foot tall rabbit. The play opens June 15 and runs through Aug. 26.

For ticket information and reservations, call the box office at (734) 433-7673 or visit http://www.purplerosetheatre.org.

The Encore Musical Theatre in Dexter is also offering a diversity of productions ranging from the heyday of rock and roll to the glory that was King Arthur’s Round Table.

The season opens Sept. 29 with The Full Monty. The popular film about a group of unemployed steel workers in northern England who form a striptease act has been transformed into a musical reset in Buffalo, N.Y. The production runs through Oct. 23.

The mildly naughty Monty gives way to the squeaky clean family classic Disney version of Mary Poppins, the story of a magical English nanny and her effect on a banker’s family, Nov. 25-Dec. 23.

The non-musical backstage comedy Noises Off follows Feb. 2-19. The comedy shows the frantic activities backstage to present a door-slamming farce. If you ever wondered how they do it, this play gives you an idea.

Rock and roll royalty is the theme of The Million Dollar Quartet, an imaginary recreation of the famous afternoon when Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins and Johnny Cash converged on the Sun Records studio after Elvis had become a star at RCA. The musical celebrates the music of these rock pioneers, April 14 to May 7.

Another country music legend, Dolly Parton provides music and lyrics for this musical stage version of 9 to 5. Parton starred with Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin in the film about secretaries rising up against a terrible boss that inspired the musical.

The Encore season ends as the last season ended with a Lerner and Loewe musical classic, Camelot, the story of Arthur, Guenevere, and Lancelot. The story of the Knights of the Round Table will run Aug. 3-27.

For tickets and information, call (734) 268-6200 or visit http://www.theencoretheatre.org.

The University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre and Dance is preparing the next generation of great actors by presenting a richly varied season of straight plays and musicals.

The new season begins with Eugene O’Neill’s nostalgic comedy Ah, Wilderness Oct. 6 at the Arthur Miller Theatre. The play is O’Neill’s fond remembrance of growing up in small town America circa 1906. The production runs through Oct. 16.

The Drowsy Chaperone is a musical comedy about obsession with musical comedy as a theater fan’s favorite cast album comes to life with hilarious results. The musical runs Oct. 13-23 at the Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre.

A Man of No Importance is another look at the theater. The musical, based on an Albert Finney movie, concerns an amateur Dublin theater group and their leaders attempts to stage a production of Oscar Wilde’s Salome. The play runs Nov. 17-20 at the Lydia Mendelssohn.

Peter and the Starcatcher is a prequel to Peter Pan. This fanciful play follows Lord Aster and his daughter Molly on a mission from the Queen to destroy “starstuff”. Molly meets an orphan boy and adventure ensues. The play is based on the Ridley Pearson and Dave Barry book. Starcatcher runs Dec 8-11 at the Power Center on the central UM campus.

Mr. Burns: A Post Electric Play by Anne Washburn is a dark comedy about a group of survivors after a global catastrophe who retell the story of an episode of The Simpsons and how that story-telling evolves over time. The production runs Feb. 16-17 at the Lydia Mendelssohn.

Insurrection: Holding History by Robert O’Hara is an award-winning play described as “Roots meets The Wizard of Oz,” a time-travel fantasy of black history set around the Nat Turner uprising. The dark comedy runs March 30 to April 9 at the Arthur Miller Theatre.

The UMSMTD season concludes with Disney’s The Little Mermaid. The stage version of the popular movie is based on a Hans Christian Anderson’s story about the mermaid Ariel, who wants to experience life on land. The musical features songs from the movie by Alan Menken and the late Howard Ashman and 10 new Menken composed songs with lyrics by Glenn Slater. The musical runs April 13-16 at the Power Center.

For information and tickets, call (734)764-2538 or visit http://www.music.umich.edu.

Eastern Michigan University has a full season of plays and musicals ranging from Shakespearean tragedy to provocative plays about current issues to a Christmas classic.

The season opens with the musical The Last Five Years about a New York couple who fall in and out of love over five years. The musical runs Sept. 9-11 at the Sponberg Theatre on the EMU campus.

Shakespeare’s Scottish play Macbeth about the ambitious Scot warlord and his equally ambitious wife runs Oct. 21-30 at the Quirk Theatre on the EMU campus.

Vital Signs by Jane Martin tells inspiring stories about women Nov. 18-20 at the Sponberg.

Dickens classic Christmas Carol is dramatized by Joseph Zettelmeir and runs Dec. 2-11 at the Quirk.

Lorraine Hansberry’s still relevant drama of black family’s fight for a better life, A Raisin in the Sun runs Feb. 8-12 at the Sponberg.

The Butterfly is the story of conflict between a butterfly and a spider based on a Persian fable. The play runs March 3-5 at the Sponberg.

Spring Awakening is a rock musical based on the German play by Frank Wedekind about restless adolescents. It will be presented March 31 to April 9 at the Quirk.

The EMU season ends with a production for children, Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse, based on the book by Kevin Henkes. It runs June 2-9 at the Sponberg.

For information about times and tickets, visit http://www.emutix.com or call (734) 487-2282.

The University Music Society has added drama in recent years to its world-class musical series. This years UMS will present three dramatic presentations:

RoosevElvis by the TEAM imagines an hallucinatory road trip from the Badlands to Graceland as Teddy Roosevelt and Elvis Presley battle over the soul of a woman. TEAM has been described as “Gertrude Stein meets MTV.” The production runs Sept. 29-Oct. 1 at the Lydia Mendelsohhn.

The Beauty Queen of Leenane by Martin McDonagh is presented by the Irish theater Company Druid. The play features McDonagh biting dialogue in a story about a conflict between mother and daughter in a depressed Irish village in the early 1990s. The production runs March 9-11 at the Power Center.

Betroffenheit is a combination of dance and drama exploring trauma, addiction and recovery. The production by Kidd Pivot and Electric Company Theatre runs March 17-18 at the Power Center.

The Encounter uses hi-tech audio to tell the story of National Geographic photographer Loren McIntyre 1969 encounter with people in the remote Javari Valley in Brazil. Simon Burney’s solo performance immerses the audience in the sounds of the rainforest. The play runs March 30 to April 1 at the Power Center.

For ticket information, call (734)764-2538 or visit http://www.ums.org.

Hugh Gallagher has written theater and film reviews over a 40-year newspaper career and was most recently managing editor of the Observer & Eccentric Newspapers in suburban Detroit.

As a kid, I flunked jazz, tap, and ballet. I could never quite get the hang of a shuffle or a step-ball-change. And forget the ballet positions. As an adult, I tried taking ballroom dancing, and while I didn’t flunk out, I still wasn’t able to master the one-two-three rhythm without stepping on my partner’s feet.

So I figured that dancing just wasn’t in the cards for me, until a few years ago when I happened to be in downtown Ann Arbor on the Sunday before Labor Day. The streets were blocked off and people were dancing in them. But these weren’t any dances I had ever seen before: someone was calling out the steps, minimal hopping around, and there certainly weren’t any chassés with jazz hands.

While I was standing there, someone asked if I wanted to do the dance. Immediately I told him that I couldn’t dance. He asked if I could walk. Um, yeah. “Then you can do this,” said my new friend. “Come on!”

And dance friend was right—if you can walk, you can do these dances! I later found out that the style of dance I was doing was called an English Country Dance. In this type of dance, the caller tells you to do things like take hands with your partner, turn all the way around, or skip up four steps. I followed the caller’s directions and sure enough, I was dancing! When I asked my dance partner what this wondrous event was, he told me it was called Dancing in the Streets because, well, that is literally what everyone was doing.

Lucky for all of us wannabe dancers, this event takes place every Sunday before Labor Day—September 4th this year!

If the English dance doesn’t get your toes tapping, there are many other fun things to do! There will be three Maypole dances, several swing dance lessons, and concerts from local acts including Annie and Rod Capps, Blue Caledonia, and Commonwealth Collective.

The North Main stage features the international dances where dancers can receive lessons in the dances of North Africa and the Middle East, belly dancing, flamenco dancing, and international folk dance; performances will follow the instruction.

The stage on East Washington showcases Anglo-American dances such as the Scottish dances, contras, and English Country.

With this much variety, there is something for everyone! Even for those of us who still can’t do a plié.

Patti Smith is a special education teacher who lives in Ann Arbor with her husband and cats. She is the author of two books about Ann Arbor, the most recent is a history of the People’s Food Co-op. Visit her at www.PattiFSmith.com or @TeacherPatti on Twitter.

Dancing in the Streets will take place in downtown Ann Arbor on Sunday, September 4 from 1:30-6:30 pm.

On Saturday evening, I sat inside a white tent in Burns Park and watched veteran performer David Dimitri’s one-man-show, “L’Homme Cirque” (presented by Ann Arbor Summer Festival), under what might be ideal circumstances – which is to say, I had a five-year-old on my lap.

This wasn’t “ideal” because of comfort – five-year-olds rarely stop wiggling, and the weather was post-storm muggy besides – but rather because, as Dimitri performed his wordless, hour-long circus show for a capacity crowd (220), my daughter repeatedly voiced questions like, “How’s he going to get down?” “What’s he going to do with that?” “What’s he going to do next?”

Neve’s stream-of-consciousness curiosity underscored Dimitri’s playfulness and demonstrated to me how the show is ultimately built on a kind of repeating pattern: stoke anticipation, tease the audience, and finish with a moment or two of joyous wonder.

With bleachers surrounding the small performance space in the tent, Dimitri began the show by changing his shoes.

This may sound painfully banal, but as is true for all the show’s transitions, Dimitri finds a way to make even the most ordinary moments whimsical and fun. And soon enough, Dimitri uncovered a treadmill that launched him into a routine – set to recorded music that could easily accompany a Woody Allen comedy’s opening credits – that involved him gradually dialing up the machine’s speed, as well as his feats’ level of difficulty, until you wondered how on earth he was going to get on, let alone how he’d pull off a cartwheel or a walking handstand.

Dimitri then incorporated a small pommel horse – decked out with a mane, a painted face, a tail, and legs – and propped it alongside the treadmill, so as to give the crowd the experience of watching a trick rider without a ring to run around. This bit of physical comedy was pure fun, yet you never lost awareness regarding the skill necessary to achieve these stunts.

While he is certainly a man of multiple circus talents, including playing the accordion (proven when he provided a hilariously suspenseful soundtrack for himself while he performed a backflip off a seesaw), Dimitri’s calling card has always been his work on the high wire. Inside the small tent at Burns Park, the crowd got to watch as he pulled himself up without a ladder, played trumpet while lying on the wire (offering a more laid back musical backdrop this time), and jumped rope.

Then, finally, Dimitri pulled a large cannon from the sidelines, made an amusing show of dressing in a flight suit and helmet, got the cannon properly positioned, pulled himself up inside it and lit a fuse.

At this point, my notoriously skittish five-year-old covered her ears and burrowed into me, but she ultimately couldn’t look away, either – which shows exactly how much she’d connected with Dimitri. This is one moment when the intimacy of “L’Homme Cirque” really pays a dividend. Every second of the show happens in close-up, so that Dimitri’s warm, witty personality shines through, and we quickly feel like friends more than an audience.

Even so, precision within each of Dimitri’s set pieces must be crucial for their successful execution, and while he clearly takes pains to get each object into the correct position, the fact that he does so so quickly and cleanly, by himself, is almost as astonishing as the feats themselves. And he never seems rushed, either. During one transition, he pretended to give a little girl in the audience a handful of feed, and as she walked over to feed the horse, at Dimitri’s urging, we all briefly believed in this flight of fancy as much as she did.

The show’s big finish, though, was far more broadly dramatic, as Dimitri pulled himself up onto another high wire, opened a flap on the tent, and waved for the audience to follow him outdoors. We tumbled out of the tent to watch him climb 150 feet into the air on a wire, toward the blue sky and clouds of the evening.

I’m pretty sure this magical sight is one that my inquisitive 5-year-old, as well as my 8-year-old, won’t soon forget.

But the same could be said of their parents, too.

Jenn McKee is a former staff arts reporter for The Ann Arbor News, where she primarily covered theater and film events, and also wrote general features and occasional articles on books and music.

L’homme Cirque ran through August 28 at Burns Park.

Nights at the Museum, the University of Michigan Museum of Art's exterior media arts initiative, will illuminate the museum's facade with artwork, performances, and family-friendly movies from September 2 - 9.

Events are open to the public and will run each night from 8:30 pm to dawn along its State Street-side facade, on the west side of the Maxine and Stuart Frankel and the Frankel Family Wing.

A digital art installation by Quayola titled "Pleasant Places" will be projected overnight, from dusk to dawn, on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. From Tuesday through Thursday, UMMA will collaborate with U-M arts partners, including the University Musical Society, Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design, and School of Music, Theatre & Dance, with each organization showcasing a related video performance or art installation.

Here's the full schedule:

Friday, Sept. 2
7 - 10 pm: Artscapade!,/a> a Welcome Week events for students
10 pm - 7 am: "Pleasant Places" installation by artist Quayola

Saturday, Sept. 3
8:30 pm - 7 am: "Pleasant Places" installation by artist Quayola

Sunday, Sept. 4
8:30 pm - 7 am: "Pleasant Places" installation by artist Quayola

Monday, Sept. 5:
8:30 - 10 pm: Family-friendly movie night with a screening of Toy Story
10:15 pm - 7 am: "Pleasant Places" installation by artist Quayola

Tuesday, Sept. 6
8:30 - 10 pm: Performances by U-M School of Music, Theatre & Dance students and faculty, including the Men's Glee Club, University Symphony Band, University Symphony Orchestra and Chamber Choir. Love, Life & Loss, a 30-minute film featuring the Michigan Men's Glee Club performing "The Seven Last Words of the Unarmed," will kick off the performances.

10:15 pm - 7 am: "Pleasant Places" installation by artist Quayola

Wednesday, Sept. 7
8:30 - 10 pm: Short art films created by U-M Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design faculty and students, including:

Zoe Anderson (BFA 2007): "Little Luminaries"
Ashley Bock (BFA 2018): "Fission"
Alexa Borromeo (BFA 2016): "Stay Out of the Sun"
Shane Darwent (MFA 2018): "Orquesta de las Calles"
Niki Horowitz (BFA 2016): "Personal Projections"
Carol Jacobsen (Stamps professor): "Prison Diary"
Andy Kirshner (Stamps associate professor): "Liberty's Secret" (segment)
Rebekah Modrak (Stamps associate professor): "Re Made Best Made Echo"
Zoe Brendan Widmer (BFA 2016): "Does My Undercut Make Me Look Queer?"
Niki Williams (BFA 2016): "Grimestone"

10:15 pm - 7 am: "Pleasant Places" installation by artist Quayola

Thursday, Sept. 8
8:30 - 10 pm: Screening of Snarky Puppy's Family Dinner-Volume Two in collaboration with UMS. (Snarky Puppy is a Grammy Award-winning "quasi-collective" that will perform at Hill Auditorium March 17, 2017.)
10:15 pm - 7 am: "Pleasant Places" installation by artist Quayola

Friday, Sept. 9
7 - 10 pm: UMMA After Hours
10:15 pm - 7 am: "Pleasant Places" installation by artist Quayola

September isn’t just back-to-school season; it’s also the moment when most theater companies (and universities’ performing arts departments) launch into a brand new year of programming.

It’s enough to make a dramaphile downright giddy.

But because we’re blessed with a perennially rich, vibrant arts scene here in Ann Arbor, it can be challenging to keep track of all the good stuff on the horizon – so I’ve compiled a list of theater offerings that I’m most excited about for the coming year. The list is organized by date, so mark your calendars!

Theatre Nova’s Dear Elizabeth, playing Sept. 2-25 at the Yellow Barn, 410 W. Huron in Ann Arbor.

Hearing about a play that’s built from the decades-long correspondence between poets Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Bishop may not, at first blush, get your blood pumping (unless you’re a writer-nerd like me), but you should also keep in mind that Dear Elizabeth playwright Sarah Ruhl is the mastermind behind fantastical, witty works like The Clean House and In the Next Room, or The Vibrator Play. I’m excited to take a more personalized dive into these poets’ lives, by way of Ruhl’s proven skills as a dramatist.

Ann Arbor Civic Theatre’s The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, playing September 8-11 at Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre, 911 N. University in Ann Arbor.

A2CT often stages big musicals, but Spelling Bee is a smaller, more intimate look at a group of driven, misfit kids (played by adults) who gather together to see where they fit into the spelling bee world’s pecking order. Sweet, heartbreaking, and hilarious, the Tony-winning Spelling Bee will likely charm your socks off. (Even though the show’s about kids, though, please be advised to leave kids younger than 12-14 at home.) Plus, one of my favorite parts of William Finn’s winning score is a love song about a dictionary – which may just say a little too much about me. Ahem.

The TEAM’s RoosevElvis, presented by UMS, playing September 29-October 1, Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre, 911 N. University in Ann Arbor.

I’m super-excited to see this show, which sounds trippy and fun and fascinating. (The UMS website calls it “a halluncinatory road trip from the Badlands to Graceland.”) In the show, the spirits of Elvis Presley and Theodore Roosevelt, played by women, battle over the soul of Ann, a shy meat-processing plant worker. This surreal mash-up of the past and the present, icons and “regular people,” history and mythology, and gender definitions promises to be a memorable night of theater, courtesy of UMS and the Brooklyn-based company, The TEAM.

U-M Musical Theater Department’s The Drowsy Chaperone, playing October 13-23, Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre, 911 N. University in Ann Arbor.

U-M’s musical theater program is one of the best in the country, so this goofy, Tony-winning show promises to be a blast. In Chaperone, an anti-social musical theater buff puts the score of a beloved, over-the-top, 1928 show on his record player, and the show comes to life on stage, with hysterical asides and commentary from the narrator. Get your tickets now, folks.

U-M Theatre and Drama Department’s Peter and the Starcatcher, playing December 8-11, Power Center, 121 Fletcher in Ann Arbor.

Inspired by a 2006 novel by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson, Starcatcher sketches out Peter Pan’s backstory, acting as a kind of prequel to the story we all know and love. Plus, this will be the first time local audiences will get the chance to see the magical, award-winning show, which made its Broadway debut in 2012.

EMU Theatre’s A Raisin in the Sun at EMU, playing February 8-12, Sponberg Theatre, 124 Quirk Hall on EMU’s campus in Ypsilanti.

I’ve studied the play, I’ve seen the movie, but I’ve never in my life seen a live production of Lorraine Hansberry’s classic play about a poor black family in Chicago who struggle to decide what to do with the patriarch’s life insurance payout check when it arrives. Each person wants the family to have a better life, but how to get there is the subject of an impassioned debate that reflects ideas about race, class, generational conflict, and familial love.

U-M’s Theatre and Drama Department’s Mr. Burns, a post-electric play, playing February 16-19, Mendelssohn Theatre, 911 N. University in Ann Arbor.

Anne Washburn’s 2012 play is where pop culture and edgy theater meet. In Mr. Burns, a group of post-apocalyptic survivors gather to recount an episode of “The Simpsons”; seven years later, we see these same characters as a theater troupe that specializes in re-enacting episodes of “The Simpsons”; and 75 years beyond that, we see how this story has been altered and interpreted by a culture still reeling from near-extinction.

Druid Theatre Company’s The Beauty Queen of Leenane, presented by UMS, playing March 9-11, Power Center, 121 Fletcher in Ann Arbor.

Druid, based in Galway, Ireland, last came to Ann Arbor via UMS in 2011 to present a fantastic production of The Cripple of Inishmaan, so color me excited to see yet another Druid production of a Martin McDonagh drama. “Beauty Queen” chronicles a battle of wills between an aging, manipulative mother, Mag, and her plain and lonely 40 year old daughter, Maureen, who’s been playing the thankless role of caregiver in an economically depressed Irish village in the 1990s. Marie Mullen, who won a Tony Award playing the daughter, plays Mag in Druid’s production. A can’t miss in my book.

Purple Rose Theatre’s Vino Veritas, playing March 23-May 27, 137 Park St. in Chelsea.

David MacGregor’s comic drama had its world premiere at the Purple Rose in 2008, and it became one of my all-time Rose favorites. In the play, on Halloween night, two suburban couples agree to drink an exotic Peruvian wine – made from the skins of blue dart tree frogs – that acts as a truth serum. They soon learn, though, that while the truth can set you free, it can also make your closest relationships profoundly tricky.

Complicite’s The Encounter, presented by UMS, playing March 30-April 1, Power Center, 121 Fletcher in Ann Arbor.

Complicite has become one of my favorite theater companies in the world, thanks to UMS repeatedly bringing it to Ann Arbor to present mesmerizing, technically innovative past productions like The Elephant Vanishes, A Disappearing Number (my favorite), and Shun-Kin. This time, we get to see The Encounter, inspired by a National Geographic photographer’s experience, in 1969, of getting lost among the people of Brazil’s Javari Valley. The audience will wear headphones for the show, which makes use of “3D Audio” to more fully submerge audience members into the Amazon rainforest experience.

Encore Theatre’s Million Dollar Quartet, playing April 13-May 7, The Encore Theatre, 3126 Broad St. in Dexter.

Though this musical has toured in recent years, I’ve never had the chance to catch it, so I’m excited to see it at Encore, which has really upped its game, in terms of production quality, in the past year. Quartet dramatizes a December 4th, 1956 recording session with Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins and newcomer Jerry Lee Lewis, with all the actors playing live music on stage. Given the huge success Encore had earlier this year with Always … Patsy Cline, I have high really hopes for Quartet.

U-M Musical Theater Department’s Disney’s The Little Mermaid, playing April 13-16 Power Center, 121 Fletcher in Ann Arbor.

I know, I know. But I’ve got young kids who love going with me to shows, and not only will this stage production of Mermaid probably be top notch – simply because it’s Michigan’s musical theater program putting it on – but it will make them happy to sing along to Menken and Ashman’s still-infectious score (“Under the Sea,” “Part of Your World,” etc.). Yes, we will likely have a post-show discussion about whether Ariel should be willing to give away a significant part of her identity to chase after a guy (sigh), but even so, the potential for stage magic is pretty high with Mermaid, so I assure you we’ll be there.

Jenn McKee is a former staff arts reporter for The Ann Arbor News, where she primarily covered theater and film events, and also wrote general features and occasional articles on books and music.

Creativity and passion hit the Ark stage last Friday and Saturday and impressed the value of hard work and following your dreams upon the completely engaged and enthusiastic attendees of the first ever (and soon to be annual – please!) Intermitten Technology and Arts Conference. The primary goal, as stated in their press release, was “to explore ways in which creativity has an ever-expanding role in our increasingly-connected world.” And they totally hit it out of the ballpark with a diverse and impressive mix of artists, musicians, filmmakers, startup founders, and techies of all sorts who came together to inspire us all to change the world with creativity, perseverance, and a little bit of business knowledge shared from those who went down that path before us.

So, what is Intermitten and where did it come from? Founded by a handful of Ann Arbor startup employees in the fall of 2015, it’s two days packed full of talks and social/networking mixers (at Rush, the Pretzel Bell, and the Hands-On Museum). There are also a few specially curated events and carefully selected stops to take in even more of what makes Ann Arbor such a great place to be – a guided bike tour by Nancy Shore of AAATA, a lithography workshop at AADL with local printmaker Jess Richard, a Pop-In at the Ann Arbor Art Center , and drinks at the Ann Arbor Distilling Company, to name a few.

And WOW. Just, WOW. I was blown away and left with my mind reeling with ideas and plans for where to take the creative energy that was absorbed by being in the presence of so many generous and wonderful folks. What I liked best about this conference was the small-town Midwestern friendliness buttered upon the toast of a technology and arts conference. I can’t wait to see what collaborations come from the connections made at Intermitten and – even more so – what they’ll come up with for next year. I don’t know how they’ll top this one!

It’s impossible to pack all of the excitement and enthusiasm of Intermitten into a few words, but here are a few highlights from two AADL staffers who attended:

Amanda’s picks:

Sean Hoskins is a choreographer and performer and is the dance technology coordinator and production assistant at the University of Michigan. His passionate talk focused on having the willingness to incorporate technology into your art form. He states that creativity happens through work and that it’s important to “notice what you notice and trust that what you notice matters.”

Kendall Burke is a customer happiness specialist at Acuity Scheduling and offered an energetic and hilarious talk comparing finding the perfect job to finding the perfect mate, and yes, she referenced Tinder and Beyoncé. Burke talked about first loves in the job world, as well as toxic relationships with jobs, and eventually… one true love – that job you were truly made for. She encouraged that one should feel comfortable, confident, and empowered when walking into one’s job, and if that isn’t happening something needs to change. Her talk also included a slide with a video of baby goats in pajamas, which delighted the audience.

Sarah Hatter is the founder and CEO of CoSupport, which offers customer support coaching, among other things. In her words, “we teach companies how to kick ass and survive.” Her inspiring talk went through her version of ten steps to running your own business. She quoted Walt Disney when saying “I think it’s important to have a good hard failure when you’re young.” In short, she encourages emerging entrepreneurs to get out there and try and fail and try again. Learn in freefall.

Jon Sulkow of ICON Interactive, a digital marketing agency, spoke about some of the projects he’s worked on. One of the Intermitten Conference evening events included the POP-IN at the Ann Arbor Art Center, where Sulkow and electronic musician Shigeto created a live audio-visual experience involving virtual reality. In his talk he discussed how the project came to be and how they created the visual images viewed through the HTC Vive headset.

Jesse Vollmar and Qasar Younis spoke together in the afternoon. Vollmar is the CEO and co-founder of FarmLogs, which helps growers use technology to create a better future for their farms. Younis is the COO of the Silicon Valley incubator Y Combinator. Keeping in line with similar themes from the conference, they spoke about using your passion to start a company, but also discussed how passion isn’t enough, and that it’s necessary but not sufficient. Know what drives you and stick with it, but also be honest about it.

Anne’s picks:

Joe Malcoun and Guy Suter: Who wants a little bit of the Google Campus lifestyle in their work? Joe Malcoun, CEO of Nutshell, and Guy Suter, developer behind the email management app Notion, presented In Cahoots: Getting Creative With Tech Space, a talk on the upcoming workspace Cahoots, scheduled to open in 2017. They’re planning to create a space where passionate and focused creatives can work along side motivated members of the tech community in a sustainable environment. It will be more than a tech campus co-op, though—Cahoots also promises an event space to serve as a destination for anyone in Ann Arbor with an interest in art and technology.

Beth Johnson: If you ask a person to tell you a story, most of the time they’ll stammer as they try to think something up. But if you ask them to tell you a story about their worst birthday party, they’ll leap right in and start. It seems counterintuitive, but limitations breed creativity, which was one of the themes of origami artist Beth Johnson's talk. In Creativity Through Constraints, Johnson revealed how working with an arbitrary set of parameters and presenting one’s self with a problem actually unlocks creativity. Your engagement within those parameters and the solving of the problem can reveal the art. Johnson also demonstrated how folding can be applied to engineering problems as well. From folding proteins to foldable structures to solar arrays, the art of folding can be used to solve a variety of technical challenges!

Shigeto: Part of the life cycle in making things is getting a reaction from a user or audience. So it’s natural that you might begin to anticipate their response before you’re finished with the making part. Zach Saginaw's (Ghostly International’s Shigeto) talk, The Pursuit of Passion, was a refreshing splash of water in the face, reminding us that one should make the work first to make ourselves happy. The monetary and service aspects of the artifact can be worked out later! He also delivered another useful reminder, especially to those of us just starting on our creative journeys: one should work with what one has, rather than waiting until one has acquired the right tools. The pursuit of passion must begin with the pursuit!

Leslie Raymond and Jason Jay Stevens: When we think of “Artist with a Capital ‘A’,” many of us imagine dour, serious, or inscrutable characters who defy us to understand or appreciate them. But sometimes artists can be mischievous experimenters who treat their work like structured play. Leslie Raymond and Jason Jay Stevens are definitely in the latter camp. Their talk. “Set the Moving Image Free,” was an exploration of the wide array of “collaborations, experimentations, curations & presentations” they create, such as animated GIF collages or mixing audio and video live in their Black Box Theater presentations at the Duderstadt. Their Peep Holes pieces present the viewer with an out-of-body experience by inviting your mind to exist in another space by virtue of the eye-sized portal. The most inspiring aspect of their talk, however, was the notion of collaboration between artists and between artists and their audience. They explored principles of UX design, which asks the artist to empathize with the recipient of the art and asks the recipient to act as a collaborator in the full expression of the piece. This was exactly what needed to be said at an event emphasizing crossover and collaboration between the arts and tech scenes!

Anne Drozd is a Production Librarian at the Ann Arbor District Library. Amanda Schott is a Library Technician at the Ann Arbor District Library and definitely notices what she notices.

Intermitten was Friday, August 5 and Saturday, August 6, 2016. Be sure to check their website for future plans.