Dessa Rose

Theatreworks presents the West Coast premiere of Dessa Rose, featuring book and lyrics by Lynn Ahrens, with music by Stephen Flaherty (based on the novel by Sherley Anne Williams).

From the acclaimed creators of Ragtime comes an engaging story of pride, perseverance, and unlikely friendship forged between an abandoned southern belle and a rebellious slave girl escaping the antebellum South of the 1840s. As a powerfully emotional score captures the rhythms and roots of 19th century America, their intertwined saga of hardship, privilege, bonding, and betrayal cries out for the independence and freedom that forever define the human spirit.