With summer drawing to a close, local theater companies are prepping their houses for a robust 2026/27 season. Live theater productions in Marin will include the usual mixture of the tried and true along with a sprinkling of North Bay premieres to keep things interesting for the frequent theater-goer.
Mill Valley’s Marin Theatre is sort of first out of the gate with The White Chip. Former California Shakespeare Theater associate artistic director Sean Daniels’ sharp-witted comedy is a semi-autobiographical roller coaster ride through the intoxicating highs and rock-bottom lows of addiction and recovery. Marin Theatre artistic director Lance Gardner directs. It opens on Aug. 27.
The rest of their season includes productions of the Harold Pinter classic The Betrayal, a reprise of the holiday musical The Gift of Nothing, Arthur Miller’stimely-as-always The Crucible and the world premiere of Ying Ying Li’s Dance Moms. (marintheatre.org)
The Ross Valley Players will open their 97th season with Death of a Salesman. Adrian Elfenbaum will direct Arthur Miller’s thrilling Pulitzer Prize-winning drama, which was the toast of Broadway with a recently-closed production starring Nathan Lane and Laurie Metcalf. The RVP show opens at The Barn in the Marin Art & Garden Center on Sep. 24.
Reprises seem to be the thing to do with holiday shows, so they’re bringing back It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play. The Players last put up a production in 2023 that was well-received.
They’ll follow that with the Stephen Sondheim musical A Little Night Music. Maeve Smith will direct the show centered on the entanglements between couples spending a weekend in the country in early 20th-century Sweden. It’s best known for the song “Send in the Clowns.”
Their New Works presentation this season will be The Many Mysterious Deaths of Jose Robles. Playwright Jack Karp explores the disappearance and execution of Spanish scholar José Robles Pazos during the Spanish Civil War. Ernest Hemingway is a character in the show as well.
RVP concludes their season with a production of Abi Morgan’s Lovesong. It’s the story of a couple told from two different time periods in their lives both young and old. (rossvalleyplayers.com)
The Novato Theater Company opens their season with the community theater staple The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. Larry Williams directs the musical about six mid-pubescents vying for a spelling championship. The kids are all played by adults, and there’s some audience participation. The Bee begins Sep. 17.
Their season continues with The Play That Goes Wrong, a show whose title explains everything you need to know about the award-winning comedy.
They’ll then present the Marin Musical Theatre Company production of Green Day’s American Idiot, and then veer in the completely opposite direction with a production of the Broadway musical version of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women. (novatotheatercompany.com)
The Marin Shakespeare Company opens Julius Caesar at the Forest Meadows Amphitheatre in San Rafael on Aug. 14 and follows that up with a production of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden. Jon Tracy adapts the classic novel for their downtown theater in November. (marinshakespeare.org)
Season tickets are available from all these companies, and I know they’d appreciate your considering purchasing them for yourself or as a gift for others. It’s one of the best ways to support local theater.
