A whole lot of deconstruction of the classics going on this month, along with productions of scripts by familiar homegrown names, from William Inge and David Mamet to Sarah Ruhl. A visit from a master puppeteer and a show about race that’s “recommended for mature audiences” look intriguing.
By Bill Marx
The Real Inspector Hound by Tom [...]

Any month that includes an attempt to get kids into the poetry of Shakespeare, inspirational women, and talking chickens looks fairly promising.
By Bill Marx
1: Shakespeare and the Language that Shaped a World by Kevin G. Coleman. Directed by Jenna Ware. Presented by Shakespeare and Company at the Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre, Lenox, MA, through April [...]

By Bill Marx
Somewhere an enterprising graduate student is working on a trenchant study of the correlation between holiday stage entertainment and the American economy. When things were looking bright and profitable the shows became cynical and comic, with mischievous elves placing whoopee cushions under our delusions of good cheer. Now that unemployment is high and [...]

By Bill Marx
October includes the usual line-up of plays by seal-of-approval dramatists, Edward Albee and Conor McPherson, but there’s some welcome new blood, from Punchdrunk’s athletic adaptation of “Macbeth” to “Little Black Dress,” playwright Ronan Noone’s latest salvo at our national psyche, and “The Overwhelming,” the Boston premiere of a critically acclaimed study of Americans [...]