"The Mother" by Black Label Movement and Sod House Theater

My first show of the 2025-2026 #TCTheater season is a new work by two companies I've never seen before, and it set the bar pretty high for the season. Black Label Movement (a dance theater company) and Sod House Theater (specializing in site-specific theater) are combining forces on a music-dance-theater piece based on the 1906 Russian novel Mother by Maxim Gorky. This "punk rock dance musical" tells the story of striking workers in early 20th Century Russian in a way that feels modern and relevant. The intimate and immersive space at the historic Sokol Hall in St. Paul's West 7th neighborhood, a center for Czech and Slovak culture, makes you feel like you're part of the revolution, and the original music by Annie Enneking, who also plays the title role, is so inspiring. The Mother is a fusion of theater companies, artists, and art forms that really makes you feel the emotions of the story viscerally in a captivating 90 minutes. But it's playing for one weekend only - click here for info and tickets to the remaining shows (through Sunday).

"Bonnie and Clyde" by Collide Theatrical Dance Company at Luminary Arts Center

Collide Theatrical Dance Company begins their 11th season with a new original jazz dance musical about the notorious 1930s outlaw couple Bonnie and Clyde. Collide uses dance to tell a narrative story in a theatrical way, which gives me an excuse to watch dance (which I usually don't have time to do). As always, the dancing in this show is fantastic (it's a great week for '30s-themed dance shows, see also Some Like It Hot). And while this version of the story might be a little too sympathetic towards these criminals and killers (I don't think their guns went off "accidentally" over a dozen times), it has some interesting things to say about celebrity culture and our glamorization of violence. But mostly, it's just really great dancing. Bonnie and Clyde plays Thursdays through Sundays (plus one Wednesday matinee) until November 3 at the Luminary Arts Center.

"Marry Me a Little" by Sklark Opera Theatre at the Crane Theater

I interrupt this all-Fringe-all-the-time coverage to bring you news of Skylark Opera Theatre's one-weekend-only engagement of the Sondheim revue Marry Me a Little. Originally scheduled for June, the show had to be rescheduled (because covid is still a thing), and has finally debuted at the Crane Theater this weekend. At about an hour long, it almost could be part of the Fringe (if only the start time were at 7 instead of 7:30). It was worth taking a break to see this lovely little show chock full of great Sondheim songs that most of us have never heard, performed by two experts in music-theater-performance.