A drawing of the traditional happy and sad theater masks icon.
Satire is big this season. So are tongue-in-cheek homages to Sherlock Holmes and Alfred Hitchcock. But there are lesser known dramas afoot from the likes of Eugene O’Neill and August Strindberg, and the witty drama Proof from American Players Theatre.
Ms. Holmes &Ms. Watson-Apt. 2B
University Theatre, Sept. 14-24
From Only Murders in the Building to the true crime podcast onslaught, everybody is a sleuth these days, it seems. Ms. Holmes & Ms. Watson-Apt. 2B grows from that premise, with two roommates solving mysteries as a contempo-feminist Holmes and Watson pairing.
Burn it Down: Two Plays from the Edge
Falconbridge Players, Sept. 19, Arts + Lit Lab
This reading of two lesser-known one-act plays, Ile, by Eugene O’Neill, and Facing Death, by August Strindberg, might make you feel better about where you sit in the sea of bad families and daily stresses circa 2023. Family dramas (like family drama) never go out of style. Falconbridge Players bills itself as “classic theater, rebel mindset.”
The 39 Steps
Madison Theatre Guild, Sept. 22-Oct. 7, Bartell Theatre
You may know The 39 Steps from the Hitchcock film, but this comedy/thriller hybrid pays homage to Hitch while gently playing with the conventions of the spy genre. There’s slapstick, romance, and four actors playing more than 100 parts!
A Timely Intervention by the Former Barber of Seville (Figaro’s Final Adventure)
Falconbridge Players + Surrounded by Reality, Sept. 29-Oct. 7, Bartell Theatre
Too many of us know Figaro only from opera — or the Warner Bros. cartoon Rabbit of Seville. (Though it is a classic.) Figaro has a long history that predates Bugs and even opera altogether; he appears in plays by Pierre Beaumarchais. Falconbridge will be presenting a new adaptation of the third play in the trilogy, or Figaro’s final adventure. Expect that good old 18th-century swagger.
Cabaret Soiree
Capital City Theatre, Oct. 5, The Bur Oak
An intimate classic cabaret experience, with music and stories, and national and local cabaret performers.
The Wiz
Children’s Theatre of Madison, Oct. 7-22, Overture Center-Playhouse
Exuberant music that pulls from rock and soul drives this musical version of the familiar tale of Dorothy and her adventures in Oz. Recommended for grades three and up.
The Mystery of Irma Vep
Strollers Theatre, Oct. 13-28, Bartell Theatre
There’s more poking fun at Hitchcockian conventions this fall with this saucy satire. Irma Vep (an anagram for “vampire”) takes on such melodramatic classics as Wuthering Heights and the film Rebecca — and, again following a trend, we have two actors playing eight characters.
The Women of Lockerbie
Madison College Performing Arts, Oct. 13-15 and 20-22, Mitby Theater
This serious drama about the repercussions of the bombing of PanAm Flight 103 on the residents of Lockerbie, Scotland, should prove emotional in a world that has not gotten safer in the nearly 35 years since the tragedy. Yet the story of how the townspeople rallied to get the clothing of the victims back to their families is cathartic.
The Birds
Mercury Players Theatre, Oct. 13-28, Bartell Theater
More Hitchcock? Yes, although this play goes back to the source material, a short story by Daphne du Maurier, where a couple takes refuge from the attacking birds in a scary house. To augment the claustrophobic feeling, the audience will be seated on the stage with the actors for this production, and the play will be performed with the curtains closed.
Proof
American Players Theatre, Oct. 26-Nov. 19, Spring Green
Brenda DeVita directs this brainy, Pulitzer Prize-winning drama about a smart daughter, her mathematician father who depends on and uses her, and one of his former students, who may end up doing the same.
Clyde’s
Forward Theater, Nov. 2-19, Overture
Clyde’s was the most produced play in the U.S. in 2022, according to American Theatre magazine, and Forward jumps in with its Wisconsin premiere. The comedy by Lynn Nottage centers on a group of formerly incarcerated individuals working at a diner, and their quest to create the perfect sandwich.
The Secretaries
StageQ, Nov. 3-18, Bartell Theatre
The theme of “a claustrophobic situation where things are not quite as they seem” continues this fall with this workplace horror/spoof set in a secretarial pool at a lumber mill. Here the satire has welcome feminist over- and undertones.
Twelfth Night
University Theatre, Nov. 9-19
Not quite the Twelfth Night of Shakespeare, though the characters — and the mistaken identities — are the same. This one’s a musical with a jazz/funk score by Shaina Taub.
The Butter and Egg Man
Falconbridge Players, Nov. 28, Arts + Literature Lab
If you know George S. Kaufman’s work these days, it’s probably for the early 20th century comedies The Man Who Came to Dinner and You Can’t Take it With You, written with Moss Hart. This is a reading of The Butter and Egg Man, his only solo play. It’s a comedy (natch) about a dreamer trying to hit it big on Broadway.
