(chair scraping) - I know this guy in a hog just landed in the truck lot.

Eye patch, beard down to his navel.

- Box not in too good a shape.

- Neither is the biker.

- Don't all jump at once.

- [Chris] The Purple Rose Theater Company's rehearsal space in Chelsea.

Early January, a rehearsal for "The Classic King," a new play by Richard Johnson, directed by Jeff Daniels.

The play follows the staff of a struggling car dealership in Detroit.

- They're just trying to stay afloat, they got 30 days to do it, the banks put some pressure on the dealership and it's four guys trying to to get through the month.

- You know, you missed 100% of the shots you don't take.

- You gonna pay danger money?

- All right, good, do it again.

Really good, really good, really good.

- [Chris] Playwright Richard Johnson had a long career in automotive journalism as the print editor of "Automotive News."

After he retired, he decided to write a play set within the industry he'd spent his career covering.

- I always thought the industry was fascinating.

I mean, not just, you know, designing and selling cars, but just the way people talked.

I used to be at dinners, at industry events and hear guys talk and wanting to throw a tape recorder on the table just so I could capture it because they had their own way of speaking.

And when I retired a few years ago, I thought it would be fun to try to work this into some kind of drama setting.

I had thought that the history of the Ford Motor Company would make a good play and I was dumb enough to actually attempt to do that.

You had great characters, Lee Iacocca, and Henry Ford II, and Robert McNamara, and great cars like the Mustang, and I thought this is a story here.

My ex-boss at "Automotive News," great guy by the name of Peter Brown who's on the board of the of The Purple Rose, said that is pretty good.

He liked it, showed it to Jeff, Jeff immediately said, "There's no way in the heck "that this is gonna work on a stage "because it's so long, "it has maybe 30 characters in a hundred scene changes "in the whole thing."

- Easier to produce.

- But he said, "Come on in, "let's talk about some other ideas."

And it was in those meetings with Jeff, together we came up with the idea of a used car dealership yeah, and very focused, one stage, four characters, much easier to do.

- [Chris] And so this play was very much developed at the Purple Rose?

- Oh, absolutely.

- I had a buddy at the Harley shop down the street, called him, they bid on it, boop deal.

Only motorcycle I ever left.

- Ah, nice work, Braden.

- Thanks Mike.

- Beginner's luck.

- I'll take any kind of luck I can get.

I play Mike, who is the owner of the dealership.

He's at his wits end trying to keep the place afloat.

He is beating back the competition, the large pervasive competition in doing all that he can to rally the troops to his.

- I play Jerry Flanagan, he's been working with Mike for Mike at Starlight Classic Cars since he was a kid.

Selling cars runs in his family, it's in his blood.

His dad did it, his grandfather did it.

So this is the world Jerry is comfortable in.

- See that got a live one.

- So do we.

- At what stage do you guys as actors come into the process of work shopping and developing these original plays here?

- Pretty early on.

Yeah, we've done readings of Rick's play probably a little over a year ago.

He would rewrite, we would do other (indistinct), I know we did a handful of readings so that Rick and Jeff could hear it out loud, do a bunch of rewrites and that.

So we were involved pretty early on.

Rick's constantly working stuff, we're working stuff.

Seeing what lands, what doesn't, and making adjustments every minute of the day.

- Listening and collaboration is so important.

And you see the work grow as we put it up, go through iterations, have the feedback.

I had an idea who Mike was and then showed up in the room and threw it all away.

(people laughing) - Yeah, yeah.

- One of the important things is that allowing yourself, you listen to your scene partner and allowing that to inform some of your choices.

- He did it, he did it, he did it.

Is this the high five?

- This, yes, yes.

- Yeah.

- Great.

- Nice work Brayden.

- Thanks Mike.

- Boom, high five like that, like that.

And boom, your cue, you can go, you can do whatever you want, beginner's luck, then hit it with- - I'll take any kind of luck I can get.

- Oh, don't take that for a, that ain't casual.

That's a, no, you're wrong, I need a lot of luck I can get.

- It's alive, the material is alive.

- It's that owning the business and.

- Oh yeah.

- Yeah.

- And walk right into that beginners luck thing.

Then hit him with that and then get to your office.

- That's the amazing thing about Jeff who will, the vision he has when he watches these guys rehearse, well, here's 15 ideas of how you could do this better and he just rattles 'em off, he's so good at that.

And it's, again, one of the many things I'm amazed about as I watch this process.

- He'll watch us throw, you know, a dozen behavioral ideas in one moment and gives us the freedom to do that.

And then says, yeah, just pair it down, make it about this, that and the other.

He's so good at simplifying the complexities that at least I tend to bring in when I'm working.

Just the wealth of experience and knowledge having that in the room is so helpful.

It's a love letter to the car enthusiasts.

Really, at the end of the day, it's a celebration of that world and that community.

Even if you don't know a lot about cars, if you're from Michigan, you're gonna understand just because our car culture here in Michigan runs deep.

You know, first and foremost, it's really funny.

These guys, how they interact is hilarious.

The world that when you walk into the theater, you're stepping into this very vivid world.

- It's one act, it's a bullet train, there's a lot going on.

It's a great story and wonderfully executed.

(people laughing) - Good, one more time, really good.