Real estate is about investing – not just in your home, but in your community. Community means more than just an address; it’s a network of friendship and mutual trust and companionship as well. It’s about neighborhoods.

Which is why, as a real estate broker in the Grand Rapids area, I am always pleased to announce events that help foster our community – like theater showings, musical events and the like. This week’s announcement is particularly heartfelt, as the Actor’s Theatre of Grand Rapids is presenting Grey Gardens, a funny, and at times heart-rending musical about what happens when people are cut off from their community, and the way people adapt.

In Grey Gardens, the aunt and cousin of Jackie Kennedy Onassis have their lives explored in two periods – when times were good, and Big Edie and Little Edie were socialites. The play flashes forward to events in 1973, when the two of them, having run out of money, still live in the mansion that Big Edie purchased in the 1920s, even though it’s had utilities cut off, water service turned off, and is infested by vermin, and is being patched up as their funds permit…but the house is decaying faster than they can fix it. It provides a riches to rags exploration of the powerful in American society, and the cost of ever lowering horizons.

The production, put on by the Actor’s Theater of Grand Rapids, is very much in line with that organization’s mission of providing, through theater, a glimpse into the common experiences that shape the human character. Founded in 1980 by Fred Sebulske, the Actor’s Theater of Grand Rapids puts on a limited number of plays per year, and is an integral part of the arts community of Grand Rapids.

Dedicated to bringing inclusiveness to the community, Actor’s Theatre brings upwards of 50 new volunteer performances out for the community, and provides paying jobs to over 55 Michigan artists each season – not just actors, but painters, makeup artists and costuming professionals, along with the technical aspects of theater that make the entire show run.

Most of the productions done by the Artist’s Theater are innovative works that, due to challenging content, social issues, or the size of the required production, aren’t shown at any other community theater.

I look forward to seeing the Grey Gardens there this season. I sincerely hope to see all of my clients and associates there as well, in a celebration of community for Grand Rapids.