Dirt Dogs Theatre Co. Sets Inaugural Season

Dirt Dogs Theatre Co. announced the lineup for its inaugural season, opening with the critically acclaimed A Steady Rain and including works by two of America's most esteemed playwrights.

In addition to Keith Huff's gritty drama about two cops whose friendship is threatened after they make a life-changing decision - it starred Daniel Craig and Hugh Jackson on Broadway in 2009 - the Houston company will also produce Five By Tenn: An Evening of Shorter Plays by Tennessee Williams, and David Mamet's Pulitzer Prize-winning Glengarry Glen Ross.

A Steady Rain will run from July 22-30; Five by Tenn, Nov. 4-12; and Glengarry Glen Ross, March 10-18, 2017. All performances will take place at the MATCH - Midtown Arts & Theatre Center Houston, 3400 Main St.

Loosely based on a real-life story line involving serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, the Chicago premier of A Steady Rain was called a "rich, thick, poetic and entirely gripping noir tale" and a "hallucinatory roller coaster ride" by critics. Reviewing the Broadway production, Time praised Huff's script as "taut" and "tough-minded" and ranked it No. 2 in the magazine's year-end Top 10 list of plays for 2009.

Five By Tenn is a collection of rarely seen one acts by Williams, who wrote such American stage classics as A Streetcar Named Desire, Cat on a Hit Tin Roof, and The Glass Menagerie. In The Lady of Larkspur Lotion, a New Orleans landlord tries to collect rent from a couple of delusional derelicts who believe they are a plantation owner and renowned artist. Portrait of a Madonna tells the story of a former debutante fighting time, but losing the battle. Talk to Me Like the Rain and Let Me Listen is a morning after story between a man and a woman longing for another chance at life and each other. Something Unspoken follows a grande dame's attempt to stay relevant by becoming regent of her local chapter of the Daughters of the Confederacy. The Long Goodbye focuses on a young writer as he attempts to vacate the home of his youth, leaving behind only memories and ghosts.

Mamet's Glengarry Glen Ross is widely considered a contemporary masterpiece. Based on the playwright's experience working in a real estate office, it explores the corrupt underside of commerce through desperate, predatory agents who will stop at nothing to sell unwanted properties to unsuspecting buyers. It earned the Pulitzer in 1984 and became a well-reviewed film in 1992 that featured Al Pacino, Alec Baldwin, Jack Lemmon, Kevin Spacey, and Ed Harris.

Malinda L. Beckham will direct A Steady Rain and Glengarry Glen Ross; Trevor B. Cone and Bonnie Hewett will direct Five By Tenn.

For further information and tickets, visit www.dirtdogstheatre.org or www.matchouston.org.