After other such entertaining productions as School of Rock, Mary Poppins, and Once On This Island, the Grand Rapids Civic Theatre is finishing out their mainstage season with yet another musical: “Something Rotten!”

To say that What to Send Up When It Goes Down by Alesha Harris is a powerful piece of theatre—or even that it is theatre unlike anything you’ve likely seen before—is an understatement. 

As a culture, we love transformation. We clamor for stories that involve improvement, of transition to a better place, makeovers of one variety or another.

One hundred years ago, a play called God of Vengeance made its Broadway debut. Written by Sholem Asch, it told the story of a Jewish brothel owner looking to join respectable society.

Pulitzer Prize winning playwright and celebrated screenwriter David Mamet is known for distinctive, brilliantly-crafted, fast-paced dialogue that more often than not characterizes contemporary men and their circumstances in a satirical way and doesn’t shy away from filth and other variations of real talk as audiences generally know it.

Before Cultivate was a space, it was merely an idea. One that had been budding in the mind of its Director and Founder, Mallory Shotwell, for about eight years.

Last words tend to go unrecorded and, in time, forgotten. Those that long outlive their speakers often surprise through their wit or profundity, and Opera Grand Rapids understands this.

The best storytellers invariably are those who are delighted by the stories they’re telling.

Pity the background character. You know: the old guy sitting in a doorway in Cairo looking on as Indiana Jones walks by. Or the overworked bartender who hands Luke Skywalker a drink, never realizing what the fates (or the Force) have in store for the hayseed-looking kid. 

The endeavor to create art, especially a fine art that requires great dedication and technical skill to master, is to be commended. Likewise, an organization dedicated to the development of those artists and opportunities for them to perform that art, especially in a new way, is a gift to its community.