'Clyde's' now showing at Chicago's Goodman Theatre, written by Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage

CHICAGO (WLS) -- "Clyde's" is a rousing play, now at the Goodman Theatre, set in a truck stop where lives are being transformed.

It's from two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage, who talked about the story she wrote full of spice and redemption.

Nottage made history, with a play, a musical and an opera on Broadway - all at the same time!

In college she had a pre-med scholarship, but abandoned that path to follow her dream.

"Clyde's" a lot more than a just greasy spoon off the highway. It's a place where the kitchen is full of people who've served time, trying hard to reclaim their lives.

That might just happen with the confidence they get from making the perfect sandwich.

"The characters I put on stage are the people who I encounter, and the people who I grew up with who were folks who in many circumstances didn't have a lot of money who were constantly battling to succeed and despite all that managed to build these lives," Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lynn Nottage said. "They discover that the way to make a perfect sandwich is to make it together."

Nottage added, "One of the things I love about the Goodman is that the audience is diverse, and the audience comes into the theatre, not just to be entertained, but to engage with what's up on the stage. I feel like the audiences in Chicago will meet the work halfway, that they're really there for a conversation, for a dialogue, and I love that."

It's quite a departure from writing for "MJ: The Musical!"

"The soundtrack of my life is Michael Jackson's music, from the very first album I bought, which is ABC to Off the Wall, which is the album that defined my high school years, to Thriller, the album that defined my college years," Nottage said. "I really wanted to understand who was the man who made the music."

Nottage said she never could have predicted where her career would take her.

"I never in my wildest dreams imagined that I would land here, because when I started writing, I always thought, particularly playwriting, that it was going to be a labor of love, that I would never be rewarded, but I continued to do it," Nottage said. "Because I worked so hard for so many years that when the moment came, I was ready."

You can see "Clyde's" at the Goodman right now, but it's only playing through October 9th. This is one you definitely don't want to miss!