Devin Scillian spent nearly 30 years telling other people's stories from behind a Detroit news desk. Now he's telling his own — sort of — as his debut play, “Bastard,” arrives at the Purple Rose Theatre Company in Chelsea. The show, about a faded country singer, his buttoned-down brother, and the old family wounds that surface after their mother's death, is set at the theater.
“Bastard” is the opening production of Purple Rose's 36th season, directed by resident director Rhiannon Ragland and featuring a cast of Michigan-based actors including Mark Colson, Joe Kathrein, Danny Ayotte, Hallie Bee Bard, John Seibert, and Hope Shangle, according to BroadwayWorld. Tickets for the run are on sale, per The Detroit News, which first reported on Scillian's playwriting debut. The play centers on brothers Jake and Beau Lambert — Jake a successful but faded country singer, Beau a financial professional — who come together after their mother's death, the newspaper's report notes.
A Texas Setting Rooted in Scillian's Own Career
Scillian set “Bastard” in Tyler, Texas, a choice that traces directly back to his own broadcasting history. He worked at KLTV in Tyler early in a career that began after he studied theater at the University of Kansas, according to the Detroit Historical Society. Scillian's wife is Corey, per The Detroit News.
Before landing in Detroit, Scillian worked at KFOR-TV, whose coverage of the April 1995 Oklahoma City bombing earned the station a Peabody Award, the Detroit Historical Society reports. He joined WDIV in Detroit in 1995 and went on to anchor the station's broadcasts for nearly 30 years, earning four Edward R. Murrow Awards and reporting from Havana, St. Peter's Square, and 10 Olympic Games along the way. Scillian anchored his final evening broadcast for WDIV Local 4 on December 13, 2024, ending his run at the NBC affiliate after announcing his retirement two months earlier, according to Hour Detroit Magazine. Ty Steele succeeded him on the anchor desk. Scillian, now 63.
Grief, Family, and a Song Called Beer Wagon
The play's themes of loss are personal for Scillian, who has lost both parents, according to The Detroit News. The newspaper's report notes he has four children of his own. Scillian wrote “Bastard” for the stage.
Music runs through the show as much as family does. Scillian, a three-time Detroit Music Award winner as Best Country Performer who has released original country music and performs with his band Arizona Son, is part of the Detroit music scene, per the Detroit Regional Chamber. A song titled “Beer Wagon” is Jake Lambert's biggest chart hit within the world of the play — a song that, according to the fictional backstory laid out in The Detroit News, spent three weeks at No. 1 and nine weeks in the Top 10.
Jeff Daniels founded the Purple Rose Theatre Company in 1991. The nonprofit theater operates in a restored 1900s automobile garage in downtown Chelsea that once belonged to Daniels' grandfather, according to the Purple Rose Theatre Company. Daniels has continued investing in Chelsea's downtown arts scene beyond the theater itself: last month he opened JD's Stage Bistro, a 136-seat live music venue and restaurant at 117 1/2 South Main Street, as Hoodline previously reported.
A Prolific Storyteller Beyond the Anchor Desk
While “Bastard” marks Scillian's first staged play, he arrives with a body of creative work most first-time playwrights could only dream of. He has written more than 20 children's books, including his national bestseller “A Is for America” and “Memoirs of a Goldfish,” according to his official biography. In 2017, the Michigan Reading Association honored him with the Gwen Frostic Award for his contributions to literacy and children's literature statewide, the Detroit Historical Society notes.
“Bastard” marks Scillian's first staged play and a new creative chapter at the Purple Rose Theatre.
