Trouble in Mind

Regional Premiere
By Alice Childress

1957. Rehearsals begin on what everyone hopes will be Broadway’s next big hit. But social norms and prejudices collide, and so Wiletta Mayer, a gifted Black actress, will finally get to play the lead role in a Broadway show if she’s willing to compromise her principles. Funny, moving, and ultimately a shattering look at racism, identity, and ego in the high-stakes world of New York theatre. This 1955 comedy-drama—planned for Broadway but canceled when the playwright wouldn’t tone down its message—finally made its triumphant premiere in 2021.

“With an engrossing history, a superlative cast, and a message that cannot be ignored, Main Street Theater’s “Trouble in Mind” is not simply a period piece from the 1950s, but a riveting commentary on race, art, and power that will leave you thinking long after the show is over.” Houston Chronicle review

“Main Street Theater should be lauded – again (as with their regional premieres of Coast of Utopia, Wolf Hall, Light in the Piazza) – for their prescience in bringing this lost masterpiece to Houston. Trouble in Mind is glorious theater.” Houston Press review

“This is a powerful production of a fine play. However much it may at times unsettle, it is a troubling of the mind much to be desired.” Conroe Courier review

The Best of Everything

Regional Premiere
Adapted by Julie Kramer
Based on the book by Rona Jaffe

Imagine “Madmen” meets “Sex and the City!” The Best of Everything is the new adaptation of Rona Jaffe’s 1958 bestseller about ambitious secretaries in the big city. These girls want thrilling careers and grand adventures—and husbands and children too, in due time. Today we call that “having it all.” These gals call it “the best of everything.” And wisely enough, they’re not sure it’s possible.

“It’s Stage Door in a Mad Men world, with a jigger of Peyton Place, and Kramer treats its soapiness like a bubble bath whose froth conceals some pretty dirty water.” —Time Out NY “This clever adaptation of Rona Jaffe’s novel is an absolute treat… The Best of Everything nimbly lives up to its title.” —TheaterMania.

Present Laughter

By Noël Coward

Noël Coward’s totally-irresistible and semi-autobiographical comedy follows a self-obsessed actor in the midst of a mid-life crisis. Forever indulging his considerable “appetite” for wine, women, and sleeping late, the London theatre’s favorite leading man suddenly finds himself caught amongst doting ingénues, obsessed playwrights, secret trysts, and unexpected twists. A marvelously comic exaggeration of the life that whirled around Coward in his heyday.