07/28/2026
Trap Door Theatre is thrilled to announce its 33rd season, a daring lineup of Mainstage shows, Short Run productions, and Special Performances. With Mainstage shows directed by Kay Martinovich, Susan Padveen, and guest director from Poland Natalia Korczakowska, Short Run productions directed by Kay Martinovich, Spencer Huffman, and Jeremy Ohringer, and a World Premiere of a new musical directed by Nicole Wiesner and Miguel Long.
Short Run Productions:
THE MAN WHO FELL WITH THE RAIN
A US Premiere
Written by Andrei Kureichik
Translated by John Freedman
Adapted and Directed by Kay Martinovich
Runs September 3rd-19th, 2026
Featuring: Carolyn Benjamin, Tony-Elias Choufani, Dan Cobbler, Heraldo Hermosillo, Emily Lotspeich, Laura Nelson, Keith Surney, Gracie Wallace, and featuring Rich Cotovsky as the Old Man with Enormous Wings.
Tickets: https://our.show/the-man-who-fell-with-the-rain
Inspired by the short story by Gabriel García Márquez, Kureichik's play is a darkly comic fable about a mysterious old man with enormous wings who falls from the sky into the yard of an ordinary couple. As neighbors, opportunists, and skeptics descend upon the strange visitor, wonder gives way to greed, fear, and spectacle.
ANY REBELLION OF WILL
Written by S.L. Daniels
Directed by Spencer Huffman
Runs October 8th-November 1st, 2026
Featuring: Terry Bell, Shawna Franks, Camilla Frontain, and Larry Grimm.
Tickets: https://our.show/any-rebellion-of-will
A tortured young man. Ferociously insane parents. A mystical drug addict. What could possibly go right?
A dark absurdist comedy with a twist of vaudeville.
OH, BUDDY
A Chicago Premiere
Written by Hal Cosentino
Directed by Jeremy Ohringer
Runs November 12th-December 19th, 2026
It's hard to be the New Guy in the world's most generic office. It's even harder to be the New Guy when you're the New Guy because you came out as transgender. And has anybody noticed that the boss is a Big Furry Monster? OH, BUDDY is a dark, absurdist comedy about how the bizarre demands of binary gender affect the way we take on roles in the workplace and beyond.
Mainstage Productions:
THE FALSE SERVANT
A Chicago Premiere
Written by Pierre de Marivaux
Translated by TBA
Directed by Kay Martinovich
Runs January 14th-February 20th, 2027
When a wealthy young woman assumes a false identity to investigate her own arranged marriage, a web of schemes and seductions unravels, exposing the fragile boundaries between class, gender, and desire. Both witty and surprisingly modern, Marivaux's masterpiece is a sharp exploration of the masks we wear to navigate society.
MAN WITH BAGS
Written by Eugene Ionesco
Translated by Israel Horowitz and Marie-France Ionesco
Directed by Susan Padveen
Runs March 11th-April 17th, 2027
While returning to the land of his childhood, a weary traveler encounters a series of strange and indifferent characters. His journey becomes a surreal meditation on memory, identity, and the impossibility of escape. Ionesco weaves commonplace ideas, images, and observations in order to unmask complex truths, and profound ambiguities.
MAGICAL WOUND
A U.S. Premiere
Based on the Novel ‘Magiczna Rana’ by Dorota Masłowska
Adapted and Directed by guest director from Poland Natalia Korczakowska
Translated by Soren Gauger
Runs May 13th-June 19th, 2027
A fragmented, darkly comic adaptation of Masłowska’s novel that explores the contradictions of contemporary life through a series of loosely connected stories. Blending biting satire with lyrical experimentation, it follows characters caught between tradition and consumer culture, searching for meaning in a world defined by instability, spectacle, and emotional dislocation.
Special Performances:
THE MARTYRDOM OF PETER OHEY Poland Tour
Written by Sławomir Mrożek
Translated by Nicholas Bethell
Directed by Nicole Wiesner and Miguel Long
Performs in Krakow on October 1st
Performs in Cieszyn on October 7th
Performs in Warsaw on October 10th
Trap Door is thrilled to continue its tradition of international touring with its twisted and hilarious adaptation of The Martyrdom of Peter Ohey. Trap Door has the honor of being invited to perform in the ‘Without Borders’ Festival in Cieszyn, and will also be returning to Teatr Druga Strefa in Warsaw, as well as at Teatr Scena Pod Ratuszem in Krakow’s Market Square.
THE GAME
A World Premiere
Written and Composed by Danny Rockett
Directed by Nicole Wiesner and Miguel Long
Performs August 2027
The Game is a new full-length musical satire by Danny Rockett — a baseball-backdropped farce set in an artificially unintelligent dystopia where money, power, celebrity, technology, nepo baby capitalism, and the business of baseball all collide.
To learn more about Season 33, visit: https://trapdoortheatre.com/season-33/
