Death On the Throne @ Upstairs At The Gatehouse

A simple bedtime story swirls into a surreal tale of four flawed souls stuck in purgatory—a celestial bathroom—in this irreverent yet warmhearted new musical with songs by German pop-rock star Tobias Künzel (Die Prinzen) and Mark Underwood.

With four new arrivals but only three spots in the afterlife, St. Peter is barely keeping his head above water. As each soul pleads their case for a second chance on Earth, ‘help’ arrives in the form of (puppet) Elvis and, you guessed it, (puppet) former leader of the German Democratic Republic, Erich Honecker.

With hints of Avenue Q, this toe-tapping romp through the absurdity of bureaucracy, the search for meaning in utter chaos, and the hope that even the most flawed among us can find redemption promises to be anything but bog-standard.