Since its premiere in December 1892, The Nutcracker has become a holiday staple, as closely associated with Christmas as are poinsettias, silver tinsel, and mistletoe. Who could forget the clockwork movements of the doll, or the battle with the Mouse King, or the dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy? Or, for that matter, the directionally-challenged stripper who winds up at a wild holiday party?

• Ballet
• Holidays
• Deos Ballet
• The Nutcracker

There is just no stopping Mamma Mia!, the Swedish pop sensation ABBA’s jukebox musical, one of the longest-running shows on both the West End and Broadway that’s been produced the world over, in about 20 languages, since 1999, has a film adaptation and sequel, and until the end of time will find an audience of all ages screaming with delight.

• Broadway
• theatre reviews

What’s old is new again just in time for Christmas at Farmers Alley Theatre. Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol may have been adapted so many times that every person you know has their own favorite version; and you may think there’s no need for any other iteration of this beloved tale. However, the play currently in production at Farmers Alley Theatre in Kalamazoo may convince you otherwise. 

• Farmers Alley Theatre
• theatre reviews
• Holidays
• A Christmas Carol

Wellspring/Cori Terry and Dancers’ Fall Concert of Dance “Food, Home, & Belonging” marks the beginning of a new season of collaborations as well as a seismic shift for the company. This 44th season opener marks the first performance for the company under new Artistic Director Marisa Bianan, a Wellspring dancer since 2018, who is taking the helm from Founder Cori Terry, their first performance in the newly-named Cori Terry Theatre, and a new collaboration with Chromic Duo as part of the 2024-2025 season of Fontana Chamber Arts.

• dance
• theatre reviews
• Wellspring

Children know that failure is part of life. No one ties his or her shoes perfectly on the first attempt. Little by little, we improve; tying a shoe, impossible at the first try, soon becomes easy enough that we don’t even have to think about it. Failure, never comfortable, was necessary to get from there to here.

If you didn’t know better, the name Radium Girls might conjure up visions of something light-hearted: a team of superheroes, maybe, with radioactive capes, or a line of glowing Rockettes. The far weightier truth is that it refers to women who, in the early 20th century, suffered and, sometimes, died while performing work they were assured was perfectly safe.

• Kalamazoo Civic Theatre
• theatre
• Radium Girls

Arts exhibitions and performances have returned in full swing to West Michigan. This season, there’s absolutely no shortage of concerts, symphonies, plays, musicals, ballet, visual arts and beyond. 

• art
• theatre
• jazz
• Classical Music
• Broadway

The world premiere of a ground-breaking new musical will take the stage at the Dormouse Theatre in Kalamazoo this month. “The Dead Memoirs” is the latest project from Western Michigan University MFA fiction student K.D. Battle, and music arranger Noah Mercil. Based on the 1881 novel The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas by Brazilian author Machado de Assis, the play brings diverse musical influences, and fast-paced storytelling to the timeless, classic tale.

• Kalamazoo
• theatre
• opera
• Hip-Hop
• Dormouse Theatre

Is there anything as romantic as classical ballet? Deos Contemporary Ballet reminds us Victorian literature, born of the same historical period, provides the perfect fodder for a new, brilliantly conceived storybook ballet with “Jane Eyre”, performed this weekend at St. Cecilia Music Center.

• Ballet
• Deos Contemporary Ballet
• theatre reviews
• Jane Eyre

To say the relationship between dance and music is an intimate one is to state the obvious, but to fully experience how nuanced movement becomes when performed to live music is quite a privilege.

• Grand Rapids Symphony
• Ballet
• Grand Rapids Ballet
• theatre reviews
• GR Ballet