Your guide to the best plays and musicals this fall

The story of a young black farm girl and her love for a mixed-race aristocrat in Haiti is the basis of this one-act musical. While the show itself brings with it a history of significant productions, its significance as the opening of the Pear Theatre’s season is overshadowed by an impending loss. Sinjin Jones, who took over as artistic director of the Palo Alto company in early 2020, will leave at the end of the 2025 season. Jones has played a critical role in guiding the company through the pandemic, while also revitalizing the 22-year-old theater company by promoting diversity and equity and strengthening the company’s educational and community programs.

Berkeley Repertory Theater, Berkeley
8 November to 15 December 2024

Playwright Jocelyn Bioh is no stranger to the Berkeley Rep. She premiered the musical goddess there in 2022. Her next visit to the East Bay is with last fall’s Broadway surprise hit, Jaja’s African Hair Braidingwith Whitney White returning to the director’s chair in this co-production with Arena Stage and Chicago Shakespeare Theater. Bioh’s play is an exercise in joy with serious themes of immigration and access to the American dream, all fused with a blistering Afrobeat soundtrack from the genre’s biggest stars. The play also features some of the coolest stage effects in recent memory throughout the show, culminating in true theatrical magic at the end.

TheaterWorks Silicon Valley, Mountain View
9 October to 3 November 2024

Following the resounding success of the U.S. national basketball team, capped by a thrilling final and a gold medal, there is no better time to delve into this story of two friends who form an unexpected bond. These men, whose destinies are shaped by the early, astonishing career of Lebron James, are the creation of Pulitzer finalist and playwright Rajiv Joseph. TheatreWorks artistic director Giovanna Sardelli, a frequent collaborator with Joseph, opens the company’s 54th season by directing this story of basketball and hope.

New Conservatory Theater Center, San Francisco
20 Sept.–20 Oct. 2024

This dark and grim musical is about a Canadian school choir that perishes on the Cyclone rollercoaster – but while in limbo, a mechanical fortune teller offers them a chance to return to life. The piece has had a somewhat crazy history since its premiere in 2008, created by Jacob Richmond and Brooke Maxwell. The musical’s success reached a certain peak in 2022 – on TikTok, millions of Gen Z users began digging deep into Ride the cyclone Songs, stories and lore. The musical is dark but also quite entertaining, and its regional premiere gives the Bay Area a chance to see what all the hype is about.

Center Repertory Company, Walnut Creek
27 October to 24 November 2024

Seattle-based Sara Porkalob is a piercing rising star who tackles the theater world in her own way, and her trilogy of plays chronicling the women in her life are performed across the country. For those who missed her critically acclaimed performance in Marin last fall Dragon Ladywhere she transforms into multiple characters while showcasing her buttery singing voice, a second chance at Walnut Creek is a gift. Porkalob’s one-person show about her grandmother’s dangerous and painful journey from Manila to the United States, performed in collaboration with the Marin Theatre Company, is a master class in how to command a theatrical space with verve and panache.

Oakland Theater Project at the Marin Shakespeare Company
27 Sept.–27 Oct. 2024

For this interpretation of one of the greatest achievements of theater, Tony Kushner’s two-part opus Angels in AmericaOakland Theater Project tours to San Rafael in the new interiors of the Marin Shakespeare Company. Kushner is not known for writing slim plays, and across two plays, angel lasts easily more than seven hours. But what happens in those hours is incredibly powerful, raw and absolutely exciting.

There are endless themes in this story about the impact of AIDS on several couples in 1985. The Pulitzer and Tony Award-winning play covers the taboo of homosexuality in the 1980s, the AIDS crisis that disproportionately affected gay couples, and the crisis of religious faith, all of which intersect with appearances by historical figures. The Bay Area is home to Angels in America in many ways, from its first commission at the former Eureka Theater in San Francisco in 1990 to a highly consequential production at the Berkeley Rep in 2018. (Lisa Ramirez, who starred in OTP’s production, also played the Angel at Berkeley that same year.)

6th Street Playhouse, Santa Rosa
4–27 October 2024

Lizzie Borden was accused of murdering her father and stepmother in 1892. She was acquitted in 1893 and lived the rest of her life in the same town where the murders took place: Fall River, Massachusetts. And now, in 2024 in Santa Rosa, her story is being performed at the 6th Street Playhouse in the form of the 2009 rock musical. Expect all the components that make up a brutal tale of anger, sex, murder and mystery, plus power chords.

As a precursor to the bloody delights of the sharp rock score of the emotional musical, there is something gentler on 6th Street, with the musical 4 men named José … and a woman named María Opening at the end of August.

Bruns Amphitheater, Orinda
12 to 29 September 2024

Cal Shakes had to endure some uphill battles to produce its first full production in two years. They ran a fundraising campaign that raised $365,000 – more than their stated goal. While the company’s future is still uncertain (the fundraiser simply supplements the budget for this production), the company is firmly focused on this 50th anniversary production of William Shakespeare’s classic on their picturesque outdoor grounds.

Elizabeth Carter directs this pastoral comedy featuring one of Shakespeare’s most beloved female characters, Rosalind, who flees persecution to find safety and love in the Ardennes forest. Along the way, many colorful characters enter her world.

Z Space and Word for Word, San Francisco
13 November to 8 December 2024