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Upcoming Productions and Other Writing

The Bidding War Available on CBC’s PlayME Podcast

The Bidding War is now available as a full-length audio drama, courtesy of CBC’s PlayME podcast.

Produced by Expect Theatre in partnership with CBC Podcasts, PlayME has gained international recognition for bringing new Canadian plays to audiences worldwide.

This season, co-artistic directors Laura Mullin and Chris Tolley reassembled the original cast and director of The Bidding War’s world premiere production to record a new audio version of the play. That full-length audio production is available now wherever you get your podcasts.

The podcast also includes an interview series with its season’s featured playwrights. You can listen to Michael’s discussion with Chris Tolley here.

If you’re a fan of audio drama, be sure to subscribe to PlayME and explore previous episodes to hear some of the greatest voices in Canadian theatre!

Two Minutes to Midnight to premiere in Turkey

Two Minutes to Midnight is receiving its Turkish premiere this month!

The already sold-out production will open in Istanbul on May 21, 2025 at Bahçe Galata. The new translation by Zeynep Yağmur Sever will be directed by Oguzhan Altintas in a production featuring Özge Demirci and Kadir Oltulu.

The beautiful poster design was created by Irem Akay.

This will be the first production of one of Michael’s plays presented in another language!

Tahtaya vur!

A Little Closer to launch The Vault Creation Lab

In April 2025, A Little Closer by Michael Ross Albert will be presented as the first work-in-development production mounted at The Vault Creation Lab.

A sister company of the Coal Mine Theatre, The Vault Creation Lab is a brand new, ambitious company unlike any other in Toronto, helmed by Artistic Director Diana Bentley. It is a space where writers, creators and playwrights are afforded the opportunity to explore, experiment and invest in their ideas in the critical stages of development.

Crow’s Theatre 2024-2025 Season Announcement

As part of their 2024-2025 season, Crow’s Theatre will present the world premiere of THE BIDDING WAR, a newly commissioned farce by Michael Ross Albert, in a production directed by Associate Artistic Director Paolo Santalucia (The Wrong Bashir, Prodigal).

When a routine open house turns into a frantic 12-hour bidding war for the last affordable house in the city, agents turn on buyers, buyers turn on agents, and everything spirals into an uproarious dark comedy of desperation and anxiety.

When I’m Gone Returns to Mountain Movers Theatre Co.

After its successful world premiere and subsequent remount at the Jettie Baker Center in Clintwood, VA, When I’m Gone will return to Mountain Movers Theatre Company in May 2024.

The Apocalypse Onstage - Intermission Magazine

February 3, 2022

In my defence, it sounded like a great idea at the time.

Back around Halloween, daily case counts in the province were lingering around the low-hanging 350 mark. Indoor capacity limits had just been lifted just about everywhere. And I was walking around town with a spring in my step that could only be attributed to this pesky bug I’d caught: hope. 

After nearly two years of cancellations, delays, disappointments, and so much uncertainty, I’d been trying to protect myself from another infection. 

But this time, I couldn’t avoid it. I’d gotten my hopes up… 

A Grave Need for Empathy - Intermission Magazine

September 14, 2017

My parents still think I’d make a good funeral director.

They got the idea into their heads when I was in high school. My Career Studies classmates and I had been required to take one of those standardized multiple choice personality tests designed to determine our ideal professions. I filled out all the bubbles on the Scantron card as honestly as I could and received two results: writer, and funeral director…