Horizon Theatre Premieres “Other Paths to God” Rooted in Atlanta Stories
Horizon Theatre Company launches the world premiere of Other Paths to God, a new dramedy by acclaimed Atlanta playwright Kelundra Smith, running Oct. 9–Nov. 8. Billed as a “juicy hospital whodunit” that blends humor, scandal and heartfelt storytelling, the play draws inspiration from interviews with Atlanta nurses and explores the pressures, secrets and resilience that shape their lives.
Directed by Alexis Kulani Woodard, the production follows five ICU nurses at fictional Morey Medical Center whose already demanding work lives are upended when $3 million goes missing and suspicion falls on their unit. According to the release, the play is “funny, poignant and just the right amount of scandalous, while revealing that the path to healing and redemption is never a straight line.”
A Story Rooted in Real Conversations
Smith developed the play through interviews and “coffee chats” with Black women across Georgia as part of Horizon’s New Georgia Woman Project: Black Women Speak. The conversations explored work, faith, relationships and the emotional toll of caregiving. “Other Paths to God is a play, but it’s also a spiritual reckoning about the way we tie our value to our labor,” Smith explains in the release.
The playwright, whose previous work The Wash earned multiple Suzi Bass and AUDELCO Awards, created characters inspired by women she knew—and wished she knew—who navigate faith, exhaustion, hope and the complicated realities of modern healthcare. She aimed for the play to “move like an episode of your favorite medical drama but also feel deeply personal.”
The Ensemble and Their Stories
The production features a cast of Atlanta actors portraying nurses whose personal crises collide with workplace chaos:
- Renée (Tonia M. Jackson), the charge nurse, returns from a mysterious leave and attempts to steady the unit.
- Colleen (Amer-Marie Woods) is on the brink of divorce after an affair with a doctor.
- Rel (Trevor Rayshay Perry) is preparing to adopt a baby while trying to avoid the unit’s drama.
- Kai (Kenedi Deal), the youngest nurse, is recovering financially after being left at the altar.
- Amy (Arizsia Staton), their supervisor, struggles to contain the scandal and maintain peace at home.
The ensemble also includes Cheryl Booker as Mrs. Shorter, a former dancer and nurse who offers wisdom and levity to the ICU staff.
A Director on the Rise
Woodard, a Princess Grace Award winner and Spelman College graduate, leads the production. Her directing credits include The Dark Lady at Synchronicity Theatre and Hands Up at the Alliance Theatre, which earned six Suzi Bass Award nominations.
A Multi‑City Rolling World Premiere
Other Paths to God is part of a National New Play Network Rolling World Premiere. After its Horizon Theatre debut, the play will move to Coalescence Theatre Project and Perceptions Theatre in Chicago in November 2026, followed by Celebration Theatre in San Francisco in 2028.
Tickets are available at HorizonTheatre.com.
The Alliance Theatre is presenting the Atlanta debut of Mexodus, the award‑winning hip-hop musical that reexamines a lesser‑known chapter of American history through live-looped music and high‑energy performance. After earning four Lucille Lortel Awards and being named a New York Times Critic’s Pick during its Off‑Broadway run, the production arrives on the Coca‑Cola Stage for a limited engagement from October 2–16, 2026.
Created by Brian Quijada and Nygel D. Robinson, Mexodus traces the stories of enslaved people in the United States who sought freedom by traveling south into Mexico—where slavery had been abolished decades before the Civil War. While the Underground Railroad is most often associated with routes leading north, the musical highlights the lesser‑told journeys across the Rio Grande, illuminating the ways Black and Brown communities forged alliances across borders.
The Atlanta production is directed by David Mendizábal with choreography by Tony Thomas and features a two‑person cast: Trent Lawson as Henry and Alan Mendez as Carlos. Mendez also serves as Music Director, guiding the show’s distinctive soundscape. The performers build the score live onstage using looping technology embedded directly into the set, layering hip-hop, jazz, and ranchera influences to create a sonic environment that evolves in real time.
The result is a performance that feels both historical and immediate. The show’s creators describe the piece as an exploration of trust, liberation, and solidarity—an invitation to reconsider how stories of resistance are remembered and who gets to tell them. The Alliance Theatre’s artistic team says the production “reminds us that history isn’t just something you learn—it’s something you feel,” noting that audiences often respond viscerally to the show’s blend of narrative and rhythm.
Critics have praised Mexodus for its inventive approach and emotional impact. The New York Times called it “an electrifying theatrical experience,” while the San Francisco Chronicle described the work as “genius in motion.” Its Off‑Broadway run earned four Lucille Lortel Awards, including Outstanding Musical, cementing its reputation as one of the most innovative new works in contemporary musical theatre.
The Atlanta staging brings together a notable creative team. Scenic designer Riw Rikkulchon shapes the performance space around the show’s looping technology, while costume designer Mendizábal and lighting designer Mextly Couzin craft a visual world that shifts with the music. Sound designer Mikhail Fiksel and projection designer Johnny Moreno contribute to the production’s immersive atmosphere, ensuring that the live-looping process becomes a central storytelling device rather than a technical flourish.
Running approximately 90 minutes with no intermission, Mexodus is recommended for audiences ages 13 and older due to explicit language and depictions of slavery. The Alliance Theatre is offering special ticket discounts for teachers, teens, veterans, and groups of ten or more.
The production marks another milestone for the Alliance Theatre, the Tony Award–winning regional theatre known for developing new work and bringing nationally recognized productions to Atlanta audiences. Founded in 1968 and housed at the Woodruff Arts Center, the Alliance continues to expand its programming with shows that blend artistic innovation and historical inquiry—an approach that aligns closely with the mission of Mexodus.
Tickets and additional information are available through the Alliance Theatre’s Mexodus page. With only a two‑week run, the production offers Atlanta audiences a brief opportunity to experience a musical that reframes familiar narratives through rhythm, movement, and a cross‑border lens on American history.
Branden Jacobs‑Jenkins’ “Purpose,” winner of the Tony Award for Best Play and now onstage at the Alliance Theatre, is one of the strongest productions I’ve seen in a long time. It’s a family drama that feels real, complicated, and honest. Jacobs‑Jenkins, who teaches playwriting at Yale and has won a Pulitzer Prize for his body of work, writes about families in a way that doesn’t feel exaggerated or theatrical. The characters feel fully human, and the play shows how a family’s public image can collide with the private reality they’ve been avoiding.
The play centers on the Jasper family, a well‑known group of ministers, activists, and community leaders. As the Alliance’s press materials describe, they’ve “been the embodiment of Black political power and public virtue – a dynasty of ministers, activists, and changemakers whose legacy has shaped generations.” The reunion they’re having is supposed to be a positive event, but it becomes clear early on that the family is carrying more than they want to admit. When a young outsider shows up and asks questions no one wants to hear, the evening shifts into something more revealing.
Keith Arthur Bolden’s direction is straightforward and steady. He doesn’t rush the scenes or push the emotions. He lets the family dynamics unfold naturally, which makes the conflicts feel earned. Bolden has talked about being raised by Southern parents who taught him that “every life has purpose,” and that once you discover it, “you can move forward with a certain freedom and clarity.” You can see that idea in the way the characters try to hold onto their beliefs even when those beliefs are challenged.
The play is long — about three hours — and you do feel the length. But it’s not slow. It’s more that Jacobs‑Jenkins gives the characters room to talk, argue, and circle around the truth the way families actually do. There were moments when I realized how much time had passed, but I never felt bored. The writing is strong enough, and the acting is good enough, that the length becomes part of the experience rather than a drawback.
The production elements support the story without distracting from it. The set looks like a real home that has seen decades of expectations. The lighting, sound, and costumes all help define the mood and the relationships. Nothing feels overdone.
The acting is what makes this production exceptional. Every cast member delivers a grounded, believable performance. There isn’t a single weak link. They listen to each other, react to each other, and create a family dynamic that feels lived‑in. It’s rare to see an ensemble where everyone is operating at the same high level, but that’s what this production has. The cast is genuinely Broadway‑quality, and they carry the play with confidence and clarity.
“Purpose” is a play about legacy, faith, and the stories families tell themselves to stay intact. It asks what we owe to our families and what we owe to ourselves, and it doesn’t pretend those answers are simple. The Alliance Theatre’s production treats the material with respect and honesty. It’s a long evening, but a worthwhile one, and the performances make it memorable.
The play runs through Sept 20. Tickets are available at the Alliance Theatre.
Cast:
- Jerome Preston Bates as Solomon Jasper
- Veanna Black as Morgan Jasper
- Donna Biscoe as Claudine Jasper
- Thomas Neal Antwon Ghant as Junior Jasper
- Victoria Omoregie as Aziza Houston
- Travis Turner as Nazareth Jasper
Horizon Theatre’s newest comedy, Holy Chicken Sandwich, takes a familiar American ritual—the grand opening of a fast‑food restaurant—and pushes it to gloriously theatrical extremes. Written by award‑winning Atlanta playwright Kira Rockwell, the play gathers 100 die‑hard devotees of the fictional Holy Chicken Grail chain for an overnight campout in a parking lot, all hoping to win a year of free fried chicken combos. What begins as a corporate celebration quickly unravels into a night of suspicion, revelation and chicken‑fried pandemonium.
Instead of a typical fast‑food grand opening, Holy Chicken Sandwich explodes the event into a full‑blown overnight pilgrimage, where 100 superfans pitch tents, chant brand slogans, and treat fried chicken like sacred ritual. As the night deepens, the parking lot transforms into a surreal battleground of devotion: influencers livestream meltdowns, YouTubers stir up conspiracies, and employees scramble to keep order as factions form and loyalties fracture. Five actors morph constantly into an entire pantheon of “Chicken Gods,” appearing as mothers, widows, corporate leaders, viral personalities and even mythic poultry figures. The result is a world where a simple promotional giveaway becomes an epic, chaotic, and hilariously heightened spectacle — the kind of big, imaginative storytelling only live theatre can pull off.
At the center of the story is Jade, the newly appointed store manager tasked with keeping the crowd happy and the event under control. She arrives ready to shepherd her flock of “Grailers” through a night of tents, sleeping bags and brand loyalty. But as the hours tick by, strange disruptions ripple through the gathering. Influencers clash with employees, YouTubers stir up drama, and long‑buried tensions among the campers begin to surface. Jade soon realizes that something is deeply off—and that someone in the crowd may be working against the celebration itself.
The play’s comedic engine is its shape‑shifting ensemble, who transform rapidly among the many characters Jade encounters. Five actors portray the mysterious “Chicken Gods”—Wing, Tenderloin, Gizzard, Thigh and Drumstick—who slip in and out of roles ranging from a reluctant mother baffled by her daughter’s devotion, to a Pentecostal widow, to a middle‑aged ASMR YouTuber, to a viral internet personality. Their constant metamorphosis gives the play a buoyant theatricality, turning the parking lot into a surreal world where brand loyalty becomes myth, ritual and near‑religious fervor.
Rockwell uses the absurdity of a fast‑food campout to explore deeper questions about belief, group identity and the fine line between devotion and fanaticism. As loyalties fracture and opposing camps emerge, the crowd becomes increasingly convinced that the “other side” is the problem—a cheeky reflection of the divisions that shape contemporary life. The comedy’s escalating chaos is matched by moments of heart, revealing how shared values can unite people even as they scramble to opposite ends of the parking lot.
Director Lisa Adler, Horizon’s Co‑Artistic Director, leans into the play’s blend of humor and humanity, orchestrating rapid transformations and reality‑bending moments with the help of Horizon’s resident designers Isabel and Moriah Curley‑Clay (scenic) and Mary Parker (lighting). The production’s ensemble staging and quick character shifts give the show a lively, unpredictable rhythm, while the design team builds a world that moves fluidly between corporate celebration, campout absurdity and mythic chicken lore.
Rockwell, originally from Texas and now based in Atlanta, has quickly become one of the region’s most distinctive theatrical voices. Her work has been produced nationally, and Atlanta audiences may know her from Actor’s Express’ acclaimed 2023 production of Oh, to Be Pure Again, which earned her the Gene‑Gabriel Moore Playwriting Award. She teaches playwriting and screenwriting at Kennesaw State University and was recently featured in American Theatre magazine as an artist to watch.
CAST
Alexander Anderson (Drumstick, Nicky)
Myles Evans* (Thigh, Kevin, Husband, Secretary)
Cara Mantella* (Jade)
Marcie Millard (Wing, Mother, Widow, ASMR YouTuber, Beggar Woman)
Brad Raymond* (Gizzard, Grandpa, Mr. True, Tik Tok Pops)
Alejandra Ruiz (Tenderloin, Daughter, Wife, Influencer, Secretary)
(*Member of Actors’ Equity Association)
Holy Chicken Sandwich runs Aug. 21–Sept. 19, 2026, with a press opening on Aug. 28. Performances take place at Horizon Theatre Company. For tickets and more information, visit horizontheatre.com or call 404.584.7450.
T
heatrical Outfit will conclude its 49th season in June with The Revolutionists, a play by Atlanta‑born playwright Lauren Gunderson. The production runs June 3–28, 2026, at the Balzer Theater at Herren’s in downtown Atlanta.Gunderson, whose work has been staged widely across the United States, sets the play during the Reign of Terror in 1793 Paris. The script brings together four historical figures: playwright Olympe de Gouges, assassin Charlotte Corday, former French queen Marie Antoinette, and Marianne Angelle, a composite character representing Haitian revolutionaries. The play depicts the women discussing politics, violence, and the role of art during a period of political upheaval.
Matt Torney, Theatrical Outfit’s artistic director, described the play as an examination of the early ideals of the French Revolution and the limits placed on women during that period. He noted that the production raises questions about political change, the use of violence, and the function of art in moments of national crisis.
The cast includes Tiffany Denise Hobbs as Marianne Angelle, Bethany Anne Lind as Marie Antoinette, Erika Miranda as Charlotte Corday, and Courtney Patterson as Olympe de Gouges. Amber McGinnis directs the production. The design team includes Candy McLellan Davison (choreography), Isabel and Moriah Curley‑Clay (scenic design), April Andrew Carswell (costumes), Ben Rawson (lighting), Jeremiah Davison (sound), Caroline Cook (properties), and Lily Mayfield (stage management).
Tickets for The Revolutionists and subscription packages for the 2025–2026 season are currently available through Theatrical Outfit. The show runs from June 3-28.
The Alliance Theatre has announced complete casting for Basura, a new musical featuring original music and lyrics by
. The production will have its world premiere on the Alliance’s Coca‑Cola Stage on May 30, 2026, with performances scheduled through July 12. Opening night is set for June 12.The musical is inspired by the true story of Paraguay’s Recycled Orchestra, a youth ensemble that builds instruments from discarded materials. The story was previously documented in the award‑winning film Landfill Harmonic. Basura follows a community that forms an orchestra despite lacking traditional instruments, transforming scrap materials into playable creations.
The musical will star Jaci Calderon in the lead role of Nambi. The principal cast also includes Dario Alvarez as José, Zack Calderon as Nunu, Nathan Diaz as Dani, Isabel Gonzalez as Blanca, and Michelle Zink‑Muñoz as Sofía. Kevin Del Aguila, an Emmy Award winner and Tony Award nominee, will appear as Mario, and Mandy Gonzalez, a Drama Desk Award winner known for In the Heights and Hamilton, will play Mónica.
Ensemble members include David Andino, Monica Garcia Bradley, Victoria Gómez, Michael Marrero, Gage Martinez, Avital Tikva Masri, Kara Menendez, Coty Perno, Julio Rey, Lannie Rubio, Diego Turner‑Figueredo, and Ariana Valdes.
Basura will be directed by Michael Greif, a five‑time Tony Award nominee whose Broadway credits include Rent and Dear Evan Hansen. The book is written by playwright Karen Zacarías, a recipient of the National Latino Playwriting Award. Alex Lacamoire, a Grammy, Tony, and Emmy Award winner, serves as musical supervisor, orchestrator, and arranger.
The creative team also includes choreographer Patricia Delgado, dramaturg Ken Cerniglia, music director Cynthia Meng, associate director Andy Señor Jr., and associate choreographer Phil Colgan. Casting is by Kristian Charbonier of The Telsey Office, with Jody Feldman as casting director for the Alliance Theatre. David Lai is the music coordinator.
The production is presented in partnership with producers Michael Shulman and Colin Callender, along with Daniel Unitas. Wendy Orshan and Jeffrey Wilson of 101 Productions, Ltd. will serve as executive producers and general managers.
Tickets begin at $25 and are available through the Alliance Theatre.
Theatrical Outfit will continue its 49th season this spring with a new staging of Arthur Miller’s The Price, presented in partnership with The Breman Museum. The production, running April 8 through May 3 at the Balzer Theater at Herren’s, reunites the creative team behind two of the company’s most acclaimed recent works: Remember This: The Lesson of Jan Karski and The Lehman Trilogy.
Directed by Artistic Director Matt Torney with dramaturgy by Addae Moon, the production offers a contemporary look at one of Miller’s most personal plays—a drama that examines the weight of family history, the cost of long‑buried choices, and the uneasy process of reckoning with the past. First produced in 1968, The Price remains one of the playwright’s most intimate explorations of American identity, shaped by the economic upheavals and class anxieties that defined his early life.
Set in the attic of a dilapidated New York brownstone, the play centers on two estranged brothers who reunite to settle their late father’s estate. Surrounded by decades of accumulated furniture and family relics, they confront the diverging paths their lives have taken and the emotional debts that have never been paid. Their negotiations are complicated by the presence of Gregory Solomon, an aging Russian‑Jewish furniture dealer whose wit, resilience, and hard‑won wisdom reflect the immigrant experience that shaped so much of Miller’s worldview.
Torney notes that Miller’s biography is inseparable from the play’s emotional core. Born into an upper‑middle‑class Jewish family in New York, Miller watched his father lose everything during the Great Depression. The family left behind their Long Island home and moved to a modest apartment in Brooklyn, where Miller worked in his father’s furniture showroom and delivered bread as a teenager. Those experiences—of economic instability, working‑class struggle, and the fragile promise of the American Dream—echo throughout his body of work, and particularly in The Price.
The production brings back the trio of actors who led The Lehman Trilogy: Andrew Benator as Walter Franz, Brian Kurlander as Gregory Solomon, and Eric Mendenhall as Victor Franz. They are joined by Cara Mantella as Esther Franz.
Performances will take place April 8 through May 3 at the Balzer Theater at Herren’s, 84 Luckie Street NW. Season packages for 2025–2026 and single tickets for The Price are currently available through Theatrical Outfit.
“Duel Reality,” created by The 7 Fingers and presented at the Alliance Theatre, offers a lively, circus‑infused spin on “Romeo and Juliet.” The show blends acrobatics, dance, and broad theatricality into a family‑friendly evening that feels closer to a Vegas spectacle than a traditional piece of theatre.
The production’s strongest moments come from its physical acts. The aerial work, gymnastics, and hula‑hoop sequences are engaging and often impressive, especially for younger audiences or anyone seeing contemporary circus for the first time. While the acrobatics don’t reach the technical precision of Cirque du Soleil — a few performers visibly shook during handstands and balances — the athleticism is real, and the audience responded warmly.
Where the show struggles is in its attempt to merge circus with narrative. The performers open the evening by moving through the audience and establishing the rivalry between the Red and Blue teams, but the acting feels presentational rather than lived. The emotional stakes of Romeo and Juliet never quite take root, and the spoken moments often land with the broadness of a school production. The choreography also creates some confusion: one moment the teams are battling, the next they’re collaborating on an aerial stunt, with little clarity about how the story is progressing.
Still, “Duel Reality“ succeeds on the level of spectacle. It’s colorful, energetic, and accessible, with enough variety in its acts to keep families and children engaged. While the acting never reaches the level of truthful behavior under imaginary circumstances, the acrobatics carry the show, and the ending delivers the genuine emotional resonance that brings audiences to live theater.
It may not deliver the emotional depth it reaches for, but as a live acrobatic performance — especially for younger viewers — it’s a fun and visually engaging experience.
“Duel Reality” runs through March 1 at the Alliance Theatre.
Theatrical Outfit opens its 2026 season with the world premiere of “Bleeding Hearts,” a new play by Atlanta playwright Steve Yockey that blends farce, social satire, and a streak of menace.
Yockey, whose work has increasingly moved between theater and television—including “The Flight Attendant” and “Supernatural”—returns to his hometown with a script that examines the frictions of contemporary middle‑class life. The play follows Sloane Burke, whose uneasy domestic routine is disrupted when her husband brings home a drifter who may be dangerous. Their already strained household is further unsettled by a wealthy neighbor who treats the Burkes’ belongings as her own. What unfolds is a tightly wound comedy about class anxiety, moral blind spots, and the ways people misread one another.
The production is part of Theatrical Outfit’s “Made in Atlanta” initiative, a program focused on developing new work by local writers. In recent years, the program has yielded a hip‑hop musical about John Lewis that went on to win a Suzi Bass Award, a touring‑ready festival of new plays, and the premiere of “Flex,” which transferred to Lincoln Center.
Yockey’s return marks a continuation of his long relationship with Theatrical Outfit, which premiered his play “Venus” last season. His writing often blends dark humor with unease, using heightened situations to expose the pressures of contemporary life. Theatrical Outfit’s “Made in Atlanta” program functions as a counterweight to its steady rotation of American classics, highlighting the city’s growing community of playwrights.
The cast for Bleeding Hearts includes Josh Adams, Veronika Duerr, Christopher Hampton, Tony Larkin and Tess Malis Kincaid. Sean Daniels, formerly of Dad’s Garage, directs. The design team features Kat Conley (scenery), April Andrew Carswell (costumes), David Reingold (lighting), Dan Bauman (sound), and Sarah Beth “EssBee” Hester (special effects), with intimacy coordination by Bridget McCarthy.
The production runs Jan. 28 through Feb. 22 at the Balzer Theater at Herren’s. Tickets and additional information are available at theatricaloutfit.org or by phone at 678‑528‑1500.
