The Underground Summer Theatre Laboratory Presents Its 5th Season With Three Unique Plays

The Underground Theatre, a student-produced theatre laboratory at Wayne State University announces its fifth summer season taking place in the Studio Theatre at the Hilberry. This unique program allows students to produce and direct their own productions with minimal faculty involvement, provides students with an opportunity to experiment and expand their artistic endeavors. Every year, the Underground explores a single theme that connects each play and allows for a season of collaboration. This year's theme, Behind Closed Doors, immerses audiences in a story other than their own. These stories are often withheld or forgotten in real life but can be powerful when presented on a stage. The essentials to human connection reside within these tales and behind the doors we close: empathy, passion, and truth. Each of the three shows this season embodies these traits and invites audiences to not only celebrate their individuality but to utilize community as a way of doing so.

The 2018 season, includes three shows: Medea by Euripides, Body Awareness by Annie Baker, and A Happy Life by Charles Mee. Medea has been adapted to further explore the feminine experience as a whole. Contemporary approaches to themes like sexuality, gendered violence, and mental health are played out through verse, group speech, and storytelling. Sometimes violent, often playful, the play maintains a staunch reverence towards the ultimate tragedy from which it is drawn: women pushed so far by the actions of men that they are left with no choice but to do the unspeakable. Body Awareness uncovers and displays what it truly means to be a family and all that it takes to keep it from falling apart. Touching on themes such as sexuality, self-image, and mental illness, Body Awareness is a true embodiment of the human spirit and a look inside the lives of those who simply wish to find themselves. Charles Mee's A Happy Life wraps up the season with a wild ride of a play. Mee sets his sights on reminding us that we are all artists and that we all create art every day, each in our own ways. In true light-hearted fashion, with a cacophony of lights, sounds, and a few cookies for good measure. A merry band of revelers guided by The Therapist, go in search for their own Happy Life.

It is certain to be a summer full of self-exploration to find what is truly behind closed doors. Tickets for are on sale now to the public and available by phone at (313) 577-2972, online www.theatreanddanceatwayne.com, or by visiting the box office at 4743 Cass Avenue at the corner of Hancock Street.

A convenience fee of $2 per ticket is automatically added to your ticket when purchasing online. Additional fees may be required per order.
The Studio Theatre at The Hilberry is only accessible via stairs.

The Underground Theatre is sponsored by the Maggie Allesee Department of Theatre and Dance, a department within the College of Fine, Performing and Communication Arts at Wayne State University.

Wayne State University is one of the nation's preeminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://research.wayne.edu/.

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