The Broken Jump

Julius McGowen is a small-time vaudeville comic who has spent twenty years pursuing his dream of making the big-time and playing the Palace. He arrives in Grand Rapids, Michigan at the end of a broken jump (a “split week,” as it were) not to find a stepping stone to success, but rather that a child performer has taken his headlining slot. On top of that he has to face a long lost love struggling to be re-ignited, a politician trying to make a name for himself by any means necessary, and an epidemic outbreak of the Spanish influenza. Shaken to his core by these events, he must decide whether it’s better to dream a dream he’s always had or to live one he never knew existed.

The Broken Jump is presented as part of the Midtown International Theatre Festival.