The Festival Playhouse of Kalamazoo College’s production of William Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus opens on Thursday November 1, in the Nelda K. Balch Playhouse on the Kalamazoo College campus and continues Nov. 2, 3, and 4. Thursday’s performance begins at 7:30 P.M.; Friday and Saturday’s performances begin at 8 P.M.; Sunday’s is 2 P.M. matinee. Thursday night is “pay what you want.” Tickets for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday are $15 (adults), $10 (seniors), and $5 (students with ID). The box office will open one hour prior to each performance for ticket purchase; seating is first-come-first-served. Titus Andronicus has undergone a complete transformation in terms of popularity and critical opinion. Once regarded as one of Shakespeare’s worst plays – to the point where some historians believed that Shakespeare couldn’t possibly have written it – it now enjoys a reputation of Shakespeare at his most theatrical, shocking, and violent. Contemporary directors from Peter Brook to Julie Taymor have staged Titus Andronicus to great acclaim, and this production will certainly add to the that tradition. Directed by guest artist Kevin Dodd, the Festival Playhouse production  focuses on the cycle of violence perpetuated in societies, especially when soldiers return from war. One of Dodd’s many innovations in the production has been to add a “Chorus of Collateral Damage.” Student actors in the Chorus have studied particular historical periods and have written their own monologues from the point of view of those who continue the cycle of violence and those who suffer from it. “As a nation, we export violence,” Dodd notes. “Our production asks the question: when they all come home, what happens then?” For more information visit the Festival Playhouse website or call (269) 337-7333.