“Lucky Stiff,” the show opening this weekend and running through March 7 at Rock Island’s Circa ’21 Dinner Playhouse, is new to area stages, but it’s not new to one cast member.

Megan Mistretta did the show in summer 2024 (in a different part) at the Maples Repertory Theatre in Macon, Mo. “It’s really a musical farce,” she said. “Doors are opening and slamming. Characters are popping in and out, looking around.”

“Lucky Stiff,” penned by acclaimed Broadway veterans Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty (“Ragtime,” “Anastasia,” “Once on This Island” and “Seussical”), is a hilarious murder mystery musical. In Harry Witherspoon receives the unexpected news that he’s received $6 million from his uncle, but only if he takes him on a vacation to Monte Carlo.

The catch? Uncle Anthony is dead and embalmed, and if Harry fails at his task, the money will instead go to the Universal Dog Home of Brooklyn, according to a show synopsis. However, also hot on the tail of Uncle Anthony’s money is Rita, with whom Anthony embezzled $6 million behind her husband’s back.

Megan Mistretta, a 2018 graduate of Emerson College, is making her Circa debut in the new show.

And hot on Rita’s trail is her brother Vinnie, who has been blamed for the crime. With mistaken identities, love interests, disguises, farcical chases, a cast of eccentric characters to prove Uncle Anthony is alive, and, of course, an omnipresent corpse, “Lucky Stiff” is an “offbeat, madcap, hilarious romp of a murder-mystery musical,” Circa said in a release this week.

Mistretta (in her Circa debut) plays Annabel Glick, who is at odds with Harry Witherspoon (played by Bobby Becher). She has her motives for getting the $6 million, which is to fund the Universal Dog Home of Brooklyn. She wants to see him fail.

“It’s so fun,” Mistretta said of the ensemble show. “Everybody gets their moment to shine, whether that be you’re underdressed, with five costumes you’re ripping off and popping through doors in different characters and different voices, or this time around, I get to follow the path of Annabel through the whole story, and how she develops. It’s a different challenge as an actor, which is fun. It’s truly a treat.”

The 2018 Emerson College theater alum lives in the New York City area (last year moving to Norwalk, Conn.) and previous credits include Dominique DuMonaco (Lucky Stiff), Cecily (The Importance of Being Earnest), Annelle (Steel Magnolias) at Maples Repertory Theatre, and Lucy in the National Tour of A Charlie Brown Christmas. Regional credits include The Producers, West Side Story, Merrily We Roll Along, and My Fair Lady. TV credits include The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.

Megan Mistretta, Brad Hauskins and Bobby Becher in Circa ’21’s new “Lucky Stiff.”

Mistretta has trained with Upright Citizens Brigade, is a certified make-up artist, and has volunteered with a dog rescue — making this role especially meaningful. She has fostered six dogs at home.

This is her first dinner theater show, and said Circa is “amazing.”

“It’s a whole community within a community,” Mistretta said. “It’s really kind of fascinating cool.”

She’s the only “Lucky Stiff” cast member who is new to Circa. “She just dove right in, and that was really fun. It’s kind of intimidating, I think,” co-star and long-time Circa regular Brad Hauskins said. “When you come here and have so many people who have worked here before and know each other so well, and to be the one person taking it all in for the first time…She’s just dropped right in and put herself out into this little family, it’s great.”

“One of the really fun things, there is a small ensemble, that just play all these different characters and they’re so fun,” Hauskins said. “Each one of their individual characters is as big as any of the lead characters. For me, it’s hard not to watch it. I always appreciate it when for some reason, I get put into a position here my head is in just enough of a place where I can watch a little bit of the show.”

“Lucky Stiff” will be presented at Circa ’21 with performances on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday evenings at 7:30 p.m., Sundays at 5:30 p.m. and Wednesday matinées at 1:15 p.m. Pre-show entertainment featuring the theatre’s wait staff the Bootleggers also will precede all performances. Ticket prices are $70 for the Friday-through-Sunday productions and $63 for the Wednesday matinee and evening productions.

Reservations are available online at circa21.com or at the Circa ’21 ticket office at 1828 3rd Ave., Rock Island. You may also call 309-786-7733 ext. 2 to secure tickets.

The new Circa show features (L-R) Jeremy Littlejohn, Brad Hauskins, Paul Gregory Nelson, Bobby Becher, Sarah Hayes and Megan Mistretta.

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Jonathan Turner

Jonathan Turner -- who has called the Quad Cities home since 1995 -- has decades of experience as a professional journalist and pianist. His experience writing for daily newspapers, public radio and local TV encompasses a wide range of subjects, including the arts, politics, education, economic development, historic preservation, business, and tourism.

Jonathan most loves writing about music and the arts (which he now does as a freelancer for the River Cities Reader and Visit Quad Cities). He has a passion for accompanying musicals, singers, choirs and instrumentalists, including playing for QC Music Guild's 2023 productions of RENT and SWEENEY TODD. He is assistant music director and accompanist for the spring 2025 Music Guild show, ESCAPE TO MARGARITAVILLE. He wrote an original musical based on The Book of Job, which premiered at Playcrafters in 2010. Jonathan penned a 175-page history book about downtown Davenport, that was published by The History Press in 2016, and a travel guide about the QC published by Reedy Press in 2022.