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Rites of spring
From Oedipus to Oklahoma! on local stages
BY LIZA WEISSTUCH

This spring’s dramatic bouquet is a colorful arrangement of ancient masterpieces, world premieres, farces, and musicals.

The music blossoms in the shape of familiar tunes and fresh melodic twists on classics. New Repertory Theatre’s Rick Lombardo has freely adapted Molière’s Scapin (April 28 through May 30; call 617-332-1646) to music by Haddon Kime. Molière was no hack at political satire, and with local funnyman John Kuntz heading the cast, we could find some contemporary jabs tossed into the comic mix.

After reacquainting yourself with the 17th-century French dramatist, brush up on your Shakespeare at North Shore Music Theatre April 27 through May 16 with Kiss Me Kate (978-232-7200), Cole Porter’s classic jazz-kissed musical comedy centered on a theater company led by feuding exes performing The Taming of the Shrew.

Another Bard-inspired yarn, West Side Story, takes the spotlight at Trinity Repertory April 23 through June 6 (401-351-4242), where director Amanda Dehnert puts her stamp on the musical standards. Meanwhile a story of the real (?) West gallops downtown when a revival of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Oklahoma!, adapted from Cameron Mackintosh’s Royal National Theatre production, brings the waving wheat and the famous fringed surrey to the Colonial Theatre May 25 through June 5 (617-931-2787).

There’s no music at the Lyric Stage this spring, but there’s musical chairs-esque scrambling in Michael Frayn’s Noises Off April 30 through June 5 (617-437-7172). The Lyric’s artistic director, Spiro Veloudos, directs this saucy backstage-set sex farce to wrap up the company’s 30th anniversary season. Trinity Rep closes its 40th anniversary season with the world premiere of Rinne Groff’s Ruby Sunrise (May 14 through June 20), the story of a young girl who may have invented television but got left out of the history books.

Jackie Mason has been around long enough that the history books can’t ignore him. He schleps his stand-up spiel Politically Incorrect into the Orpheum May 1 (617-931-2000). And speaking of septuagenarian New Yorkers: Edward Albee has a new play going up at Hartford Stage May 20 through June 20 (860-527-5151). We know the sorry tales of the explosive duo in The Zoo Story, but in the world premiere of Homelife, Albee reveals what happened to Peter at home on the morning he and his fellow Central Park bench warmer mull over the now legendary trip to the zoo. The classic and its prequel are on a double bill.

From May 14 through June 13, Huntington Theatre Company artistic director Nicholas Martin is at the helm of Tennessee Williams’s The Rose Tattoo (617-266-0800), which stars SCTV alum Andrea Martin as a Sicilian seamstress who relies on the comfort of her memories when her husband dies. When the truth comes out about him, she turns to a truck driver for solace.

There’s domestic dysfunction of a classic strain at the American Repertory Theatre May 15 through June 13 when Robert Woodruff directs Sophocles’s Oedipus (617-547-8300), one of the foundations of Western drama — not to mention psychology. Classic psychological plots also play out at Emerson’s Cutler Majestic April 7 through 10 when Minneapolis’s Guthrie Theater Company takes its show on the road for the first time in 17 years with a touring production of Othello (800-233-3123).

SpeakEasy Stage Company has William (Falsettos) Finn’s Elegies: A Song Cycle, a musical tribute to loved ones in his life, May 7 through 29 (617-426-2787). For a serving of Italian family stories in your dramatic diet, help yourself to John C. Picardi’s The Sweepers at Stoneham Theatre April 1 through 18 (781-279-2200). It’s the tale of immigrants adjusting to their new lives in the North End after World War II. Memories of growing up are also at the core of the Súgán Theatre Company’s regional premiere of Owen McCafferty’s Mojo Mickybo April 2 through 24 (617-426-2787), a favorite at the Edinburgh and Dublin Fringe Festivals. Set in Belfast in the 1970s and the present, it chronicles the friendship of two boys who share an obsession with Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. And childhood has a tragic-comic kick in Boston Theatre Works’ production of David Lindsay-Abaire’s Kimberly Akimbo April 30 through May 16 (617-939-9939). It centers on a teenager at odds with time because of a rare disease that causes her body to age four and a half times as fast as it should.

Bodies move quickly on dancing feet across the city this spring. FleetBoston Celebrity Series (800-447-7400) has the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater at the Wang Theatre April 13 through 18, and the Paul Taylor Dance Company at the Shubert May 21 through 23. Boston Ballet (617-695-6955) will reprise Val Caniparoli’s Lady of the Camellias April 1 through 4 before concluding its season with Swan Lake May 13 through 23. And World Music (617-876-4275) brings eight Greater Boston choreographers to Green Street Studios in Central Square April 16 and 17 for a third annual showcase of works in progress, "Ten’s the Limit."


Issue Date: March 26 - April 1, 2004
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