courtesy of iTheatre Collaborative

Kristina Rogers and Peter Ross Stephens in Gruesome Playground Injuries

The simplest things are the most difficult. When your options are limited, when there are only so many choices to make, one misstep is a glaring note of dissonance. Little mistakes are comparatively easy to hide in an epic extravaganza. In something like a plain roast chicken or an ikebana arrangement, perfection is more of a challenge but also more of a triumph.

That's one of the alluring things about iTheatre's current production of Gruesome Playground Injuries by Rajiv Joseph, who also wrote Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, a Pulitzer Prize finalist.

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courtesy of Th [sic] Sense

At first, I wasn't sure that Th [sic] Sense: No Class! has any sort of seasonal theme (not that I need my sketch comedy compilation shows to have a theme of any kind). But I couldn't discern anything about the weather being crappy or school being out (or bad blockbuster films or lamesauce grill-based holidays, or whatever summer means to you).

Now, though, as I look at the list of sketches on the show's program, I realize there was a lot of wetness. A lot of pee and poop and semen and lady-cum, a bit of saliva and, as a bonus, a sketch by Portia Beacham that features pudding, condiments, ice cream cake, and Tabasco. And keeping wet is a great way to keep cool -- not just disgusting!

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courtesy of Orange Theatre Group

A lot of experimental theater is quite sociopolitical in its messages, be they overt or subtle. Chris Danowski, whose plays are mostly on the not-your-father's-Oldsmobile side, has indeed written plays like that, which are critical and thought-provoking, while still funny and entertaining (FrogWoman, for instance, which despite everything is the most linear of his works that I've seen).

But as far as I can tell, Danowski is more attuned to human microrelations -- to one-on-one conversations, subconscious mysteries, and the desperately urgent messages of poetry and romance that are never entirely understood no matter how many ways we try to express them. Sometimes it seems as though, as a writer, he doesn't even necessarily prefer that that's the case, just as, as an audience member, you might not, either. It simply is.

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Courtesy photo

Wartime is hell: Childsplay's The Color of Stars triumphs.

The Color of Stars at Tempe Center for the Arts doesn't shy away from adult themes.

The play, by Tempe Children's Theatre playwright in residence Dwayne Hartford, is set in rural America during World War II. Acting, directing, and set design all combine to create a beautiful production, writes New Times theater critic Robrt L Pela.

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courtesy of Desert Rose Theatre

Carson Saline as Dorian Gray

I know I've lost an arm-wrestling match with a classic piece of literature if I can easily follow a story from beginning to end and don't feel confused, yet just can't shake that feeling of not knowing what the big effing deal was. But you know you've been lucky enough to stumble upon an excellent theater experience when such a story is brought to life in a way that keeps you thinking about it nevertheless. And if it the whole thing happens in a mysterious under-construction resurrection of an outlet mall with security gates clanking down and electric drills and sanders running all through the first act, somebody's going to Heaven for sure, as my mother-in-law sometimes asserts.

Katherine Stewart, an excellent actor and director who co-founded Desert Rose Theatre in 2005, was gracious and upbeat in the curtain speech for her adaptation of The Picture of Dorian Gray as she welcomed us to her company's third venue so far this season. I'm confident that if the whole enterprise that is Mesa's Power Square Mall doesn't go under by next fall, things will keep looking up, and it certainly can't be any worse than last season's DRT roost between a piano store and some lady who scheduled live children's storytime during the troupe's performances. In the meantime, sit close to the playing area, grab the available blankets until the A/C gets fine-tuned, and enjoy a company that's devoted to the classics and wins awards for a reason.

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Laura Durant

Clockwise from top left: Dion Foreman, Joseph A. Gaxiola, Wes Hart, Bronwyn Schile, Tyler Pounds, and James Asimenios wrestle with their inner demons in The Golden Gays.

Oy, where to start? Well, first, for the sake of clarity, Soul Invictus' The Golden Gays is not presented by our beloved AZ Gender Outlaws -- so, for example, it's neither the same show nor the same performers as this word-for-word drag re-enactment of an episode of The Golden Girls.

Whether that makes you more or less anxious to see it is not our problem. But it's a brand-new play, including parody musical production numbers, with a whole lot of dresses on a handful (I wish, right?) of men. Much of its pedigree comes from members of Th [sic] Sense sketch comedy troupe and other Soul Invictus (and old @Pro) shows, like the people who brought us Head: The Musical, so when you're floored by gob-smackingly stunning jokes, visual humor from left field or farther, and characters so richly quirky you have to believe in them, you'll know whom to blame.

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courtesy of Duane Daniels

Jenny Strickland and BC Verhoeven kill a little time while dreaming of Australia.

Subject matter isn't one of the generally accepted elements of drama (such as plot, character, theme, and dialogue) that we've ticked off on our fingers since classical times -- maybe because every play has it, and excellence doesn't really depend on exactly what it is. But it is an attribute that helps identify a show and make it easy to get worked up about, if that's your thing: e.g., the pregnant nun show, the draft-dodging hippie show, the nude horse-blinding show.

Karin Diann Williams' Australia , currently at Space 55, is "about" teenagers in what appear to be traditional, inexorable, downward spirals -- young people who never finish what they start, whether it's high school, a stint in the Marines, a robbery, a murder, a marriage, a baby, or even a cigarette. But what keeps it from being just another dismal "kids with problems" play is tongue-in-cheek comedy of several flavors, from the dark to the absurd to the bravely character-based.

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Spiritualized: This House is a beautifully realized adaptation.

The House of the Spirits, now at ASU's Galvin Playhouse is based on Isabel Allende's bestselling, first novel, and is a "splendid production" writes New Times contributor Robrt Pela, in this week's stage review. Pela writes: More >>

John Groseclose

Amanda Melby (left) and Maria Amorocho in Body Awareness

It's no one's fault but my own (okay, and maybe that of the design of Actors Theatre's promo poster below) that I'd really hoped Annie Baker's Body Awareness would delve deeply into the topic of body acceptance even while being funny, moving, and well-acted.

It doesn't in particular. For example, although the character Phyllis, a psychology professor, starts to talk about the male gaze, she almost immediately gets confused and then needs to leave the stage -- partly because she's unsuccessfully thinking out loud about a largely private matter in public and partly because, at that moment, she's really only there to introduce a Body Awareness Week performance event, such as a Palestinian child refugee dance company or Vermont's premier biracial troubadour couple.

And that's not a deficiency in the script -- the issue of looksism in our culture and how those who are objectified respond to it is not the play's job to analyze, let alone to resolve. Even though Baker's Circle Mirror Transformation from last season took place at an acting class, and its events were driven by the class, I realize, looking back, that it wasn't literally about acting. It was about people and, in a way, about accepting every bit of them (which, if you're being generous, should include their bodies), and not merely in the way good actors do.

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Tim Fuller

From left, William Peden, Sofia Jean Gomez, Monette Magrath, and David Andrew Macdonald in The Great Gatsby.

Some great works of literature are challenging to read, even if you enjoy reading fiction. And sometimes an excellent film or play can introduce you to an enjoyable book or author you might not otherwise have happened upon.

But I'm afraid that the effect of Arizona Theatre Company's production of Simon Levy's adaptation The Great Gatsby might well be to disappoint you, if you're familiar with F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel, or to deter you from reading a page-turning work that still deserves all the hype, if you aren't. (It's in the public domain in Australia, so you can check it out right now, unless you're planning to attend the play or Baz Luhrmann's upcoming film -- currently scheduled for a Christmas Day release -- and are concerned about plot spoilers.)

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