Three Houston Theaters Partner To Bring Extraordinary Play Trilogy To Houston

Main Street Theater, Stages Repertory Theatre, and Mildred's Umbrella Theater Company, in connection with Sin Muros: A Latinx Theater Festival at Stages, present Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award winner Quiara Alegría Hudes' Elliot Trilogy. While all are stand-alone plays, they follow the story of Elliot and his mother across the wars in which they served and through their lives as they strive for peace and connection. The trilogy revolves around Elliot Ortiz, a Puerto Rican Marine veteran from Philadelphia. Hudes told American Theatre Magazine that Elliot's story is "both quintessentially American and a great representation of the Puerto Rican experience, including the rough patches and demons [Elliot] has had to survive to become stable and successful." Elliot is based on her own cousin of the same name.

Houston audiences have the rare opportunity to see the entire trilogy. Main Street Theater's production of Elliot, A Soldier's Fugue (Part I) and Stages Repertory Theatre's production of Water by the Spoonful (Part II) open 1 week apart in February 2020. The Happiest Song Plays Last (Part III) will have a staged reading at MST during the first week of March.

After Stages announced their 2019-2020 Season last spring, including Hudes' Water by the Spoonful, MST Executive Artistic Director Rebecca Greene Udden, who had admired the trilogy for some time, reached out to Stages' Artistic Director Kenn McLaughlin. She proposed the idea of a cross-theater trilogy: MST would produce Part I, Stages would produce Part II, and she would reach out to Mildred's about producing a staged reading of Part III. McLaughlin was immediately on board with the proposal, and soon to follow was Mildred's' Artistic Director Jennifer Decker. The trilogy, while produced by the three different theaters, is featured also as part of Stages' third annual Sin Muros: A Latinx Theater Festival, which is programmed by a community-based advisory committee with leadership from Festival Coordinator Trevor Boffone.

This sort of collaboration across theaters has rarely, if ever, been done in Houston. All three artistic directors are excited to be able to offer Houston audiences this extraordinary series.

For details about each production, please visit MainStreetTheater.com, StagesTheatre.com, MildredsUmbrella.com

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