Collaborative Theatre Project brings classic plays such as "A Midsummer Night's Dream," pictured, as well as delivering fresh spins and new shows to Rogue Valley audiences.

Approaching its first decade, Collaborative Theatre Project is readying eight new productions to its Medford stage for its recently announced 2025 season.

Next year’s season will include classic productions such as Tennessee Williams’ “A Streetcar Named Desire” as well as new and lesser known plays such as “The Victorian Ladies Detective Collective.”

“Our 2025 season includes new works that we feel have general appeal to people, as well as classics,” said Susan Aversa, artistic director for Collaborative Theatre Project. “We’ve found a niche, I think, in presenting works where people understand the stories but with newer, updated versions of them.”

The nonprofit theatre group’s schedule for 2025 is as follows: “The Lion in Winter” (Jan. 23 to Feb. 16), “Moriarty” (March 20 to April 13), “Mary’s Wedding” (May 8 to May 18), “My Fair Lady” (June 12 to July 6), “Dear Jack, Dear Louise” (July 17 to July 27), “A Streetcar Named Desire” (Aug. 14 to Sept. 7), “The Victorian Ladies Detective Collective” (Oct. 9 to Nov. 2) and “Twelfth Night” (Nov. 20 to Dec. 28).

Show tickets are expected to go on sale by the start of September at Collaborative Theatre Project’s website, ctpmedford.org.

The theatre is located at 555 Medford Center in Medford’s The Village shopping center.

Each of the shows will bring an enthralling spectacle to audiences, starting with “The Lion in Winter,” which is based off of the 1968 film classic starring Katharine Hepburn.

“That opens the season and we put it at the top of the season because it’s about Henry and Eleanor having Christmas together, and that fits well into the January post-Christmas time,” Aversa said. “It’s a family story, a love story.”

After the production of “Moriarty,” the theatre will present a striking, two-character play set during World War I with “Mary’s Wedding.”

“It is absolutely exquisite by Canadian playwright Stephen Massicotte,” Aversa said. “The young couple falls in love and he goes off to war, and it’s their story.”

Another production Aversa and her team are excited to share includes Medford itself as one of the settings used during the play.

“The play is about how (playwright) Ken Ludwig’s parents met,” Aversa said of the romantic production “Dear Jack, Dear Louise.” 

“It’s set in World War II with two young people, and (the man) was stationed in Medford, so it’s really cool because we’re actually part of its setting.”

Later in the 2025 season, Collaborative Theatre Project will bring a new spin to the Victorian detective genre with a feminine twist.

“We’re doing a wonderful new play from a playwright in the San Francisco Bay Area called ‘The Victorian Ladies Detective Collective,’” Aversa said. “It’s really exciting to do new works. It’s Sherlock Holmes in petticoats. … The ladies are frustrated by Scotland Yard (London’s metropolitan police force) and make their own detective agency.”

With two of the more experimental plays running for approximately a week and a half, organizers aim to gauge interest in “Mary’s Wedding” and “Dear Jack, Dear Louise” with the option of expanding the show dates if one or both productions end up being popular.

“It goes back to our direction of trying to find new ways to engage with people and coming back from COVID,” she said. “It gives us an opportunity to present new works in shortened formats.”

Collaborative Theatre Project started in 2016, bringing popular, new and niche productions to Medford audiences.

The nonprofit boasts a 92-seat theatre and also runs community outreach and education programs alongside its plays.

“What we’ve found that works best for us — because we have such an intimate theatre — is taking shows that are known as classics like “A Christmas Carol” or “Baskerville” with a more contemporary twist,” Aversa said.

Currently, the theater group is putting on Ludwig’s “Baskerville,” which follows iconic fictional detective Sherlock Holmes and his assistant Dr. Watson as they race to crack the mystery of “The Hound of the Baskervilles” before a family curse dooms its newest heir. The play will be on stage through Sept. 15.

Tickets for the production can be purchased at ctpmedford.org/2024-season.

To learn more about the theater or sign up to volunteer, visit ctpmedford.org or call 541-779-1055.