One of the most beloved stage musicals in American history, as well as a Tony Award nominee whose iconic show tune "Day by Day" reached number 13 on the Billboard pop singles chart, composer Stephen Schwartz's timeless Godspell serves as this year's fundraising performance by Muscatine's New Era Dinner Theatre, its September 29 through October 1 run finding its proceeds benefiting Lutheran World Relief, the Muscatine Chapter of the Salvation Army, and New Era Lutheran Church.

It’s always interesting when a season is rounded out with a previously unfamiliar title, and in the case of the Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse's season-ender, it’s Paul Slade Smith’s politically themed The Outsider.

After an annually busy summer, September is a traditionally light month for area theatre. But Moline's Playcrafters Barn Theatre will be making up for the paucity of new titles by debuting no fewer than 10 plays – if 10 very short plays – in the venue's inaugural Write All Night 24-Hour Play Festival, a September 16 fundraising event that will find audiences treated to works by local authors, directors, and actors written, directed, rehearsed, and performed over the course of a single day.

Lauded by Broadway World as "an insightful, witty satire about modern American politics" and by Let's Go to the Theater as "one of the funniest shows you will see this year," author Paul Slade Smith's The Outsider makes its Quad Cities debut at Rock Island's Circa '21 Dinner Playhouse from September 13 through October 29, the San Diego Union-Tribune adding that the play is "not only genuinely and consistently funny, but has something eloquent to say about the meaning of leadership."

The Playcrafters Barn Theatre has kept us in suspense for months since postponing Witness for the Prosecution in March due to cast illnesses. Now the play is on its feet at last, with most of the original cast.

Based on the beloved Janet Letnes Martin and Suzann Nelson book Growing Up Lutheran and an ever-popular stage entertainment for nearly 20 years, Church Basement Ladies makes an eagerly awaited return to Mt. Carroll's Timber Lake Playhouse, its September 8 through 17 run sure to demonstrate why Broadway World called the experience “a completely fun evening” that's “really, really funny.”

Fans of T Green, Calvin Vo, and their uniquely riotous theatre and comedy troupe Haus of Ruckus are invited to see where it all began, and where it's going next, when the Black Box Theatre hosts a two-night reprise of HoR's stage debut “Jacques”alope on August 25 and 26, offering a one-hour version of this hysterical 2021 work that heads to the Elgin Fringe Festival next month.

Praised by The Guardian as “perfectly crafted” and “beautifully scripted,” the wildly entertaining Agatha Christie mystery Witness for the Prosecution enjoys a September 1 through 4 staging at Moline's Playcrafters Barn Theatre following the forced delay of its originally scheduled run this past March.

The Playcrafters Barn Theatre's current production Circle Mirror Transformation sounds très à l'avant-garde. However, though it's unconventionally staged, it's one of the most authentic theatrical slices of life I've ever tucked into.

On Thursday, I made my third trek in three weeks to the Timber Lake Playhouse – this time to see Jersey Boys, which is about Frankie Valli & the Four Seasons' fascinating rise to fame. The show, boasting music by these early rock-and-roll legends, ran on Broadway from 2005 to 2017, winning four Tonys. I haven't seen the 2014 movie, but even if you have, see this. Seriously.

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