Critic's Theater Picks

Let’s say you’ve got all the time in the world. By all means, see every play at every local theater this season. If you’re forced to narrow it down, here are my top picks. And, no, I don’t have a theater-meter. My selection criteria include the play’s quality (based on those I’ve seen and critical buzz), the track records of the playwrights, directors and actors, a sense of an acting troupe’s strengths, fascination with the subject matter, a support for risk taking, gut feeling and my own idiosyncratic tastes.

‘Children of a Lesser God’

Oct. 20 through Nov. 16 at the Manatee Performing Arts Center. Call 748-5875.

Disability is a minefield of a topic. Plays addressing it can be clueless, preachy and exploitive — but rarely nuanced. Mark Medoff’s “Children of a Lesser God” is one exception. His on-again, off-again love story goes beyond mere hearing loss to the culture that’s grown around it — a deaf community that even has its own language. (And losses in translation when “speaking” to outsiders.) Medoff’s play deals with the signal noise of human communication as much as deafness; it’s a multilayered work, yielding new meaning every time you see it. (Sign language interpreters will be present at every performance.)

‘Young Frankenstein’

Nov. 2 through 20 at the Players Centre for Performing Arts. Call 365-2494.

Mel Brooks added music and a few million volts and brought “Young Frankenstein” to life on the Broadway stage. Like the original movie, Brooks’ musical is a love letter to the classic Universal Studios horror movies. If a theater can afford the crackling electrical effects of Van de Graff generators and Jacob’s Ladders, great. But you don’t need all that equipment to get laughs. Brooks’ comedy doesn’t require elaborate production values to make you bust a stitch; funny actors are all it takes. This tale of a singing/dancing formerly dead guy is perfect for community theater.

‘Million Dollar Quartet’

Nov. 11 through Jan. 1 at Florida Studio Theatre. Call 366-9000. 

Back in 1956, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and Elvis Presley had a legendary jam session at Sun Records. Colin Escott and Floyd Mutrux’s Tony Award-winning “Million Dollar Quartet” makes you a fly on the recording studio wall. On one level, it’s a jukebox musical. (Push G-7 and it’s “Blue Suede Shoes.” Punch B-12, and it’s “Great Balls of Fire.”) But it’s more than ‘50s rock fan service—it’s a ride on a dynamite truck on a bumpy mountain road. These singers had egos to match their talents. Sam Phillips didn’t get their explosive words on tape, but this probably comes close.

‘The Great Society’

Jan. 13 through April 12 at the FSU Center for the Performing Arts. Call 351-8000.

Speaking of monsters, President Lyndon Johnson was one of the sacred monsters of American politics. He was the anti-JFK: crude not smooth; Texan, not east coast elite; and a face like a battlefield. Robert Schenkkan’s “The Great Society” will soon unleash him on stage. The play is a follow up to Schenkkan’s “All the Way,” one of last season’s standout performances at the Asolo Rep. Jack Willis, the actor who originated the role, will portray Johnson this year. While the script is great, it’s the actor who makes the difference. Willis channels LBJ in an acclaimed performance. It’s not a surface imitation, but a grasp of the man’s soul.

‘Ideation’

Jan. 27 through March 12 at Urbanite Theatre. Call 321-1397.

Aaron Loeb’s darkly comic “Ideation” imagines the unthinkable. (A contradiction in terms. Think-tanks and Stephen King do it all the time.) Anyway, let’s suppose there’s a fatal, highly contagious virus infecting millions of people, who, for argument’s sake, are quarantined. And, just hypothetically, killed to keep the virus from spreading. These scenarios emerge, not from the mind of Dr. Strangelove, but a group of sunny brainstormers around a conference table. Loeb’s twistedly funny play resembles a hybrid of Camus’ “The Plague” and “The Office.” Urbanite likes to take it to the edge. Black comedy takes it up a notch — and this is as dark as it gets. Let’s see how far they can go and still get laughs.

‘The Girls Groups: The ‘60s Explosion’

March 4 through April 9 at Westcoast Black Theatre. Call 366-1505.

Nate Jacobs has created his share of musical tributes to the giants of African-American music. His revues are history lessons, shedding light on the struggles of performers like Marvin Gaye and Sam Cooke. So far, these singers have all been male. Now, Jacobs gives equal time to The Supremes, The Shirelles, The Marvellettes, The Shangri-Las and other stellar female talents. This time, he’ll look at the dues these women paid to get on center stage. Jacobs says it’s a labor of love — and it’s going to be worth the wait.

‘Inherit the Wind’

April 11 through Dec. 30 at Venice Theatre. Call 488-1115.

In 1925, the Tennessee Legislature banned teaching evolution in the public schools. A science teacher defied the law — and wound up on trial. Clarence Darrow defended him; William Jennings Bryan prosecuted. Jerome Lawrence and Robert Edwin Lee’s play offers a thinly disguised account of this battle of the titans. Evolution is just the surface issue; it’s really about telling people how to think. Director Kelly Woodland helms the production. She always makes you think — and never repeats what other directors have done.

‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’

April 12 through 29 at Marie Selby Botanical Gardens. Call 351-8000.

The standard notion of this Shakespeare classic suffers from the prosaic effect of putting a dream into words. (“I had a dream I was in this forest — then a magic fairy turned a bad actor into a donkey and the fairy queen fell in love with him.”) There’s more to it than that. Shakespeare’s forest is a supernatural realm not unlike the subconscious mind. The humans who wind up there experience something close to an alien abduction. Afterward, Puck calms the audience. “It’s just a dream.” How comforting. Like the 1968 film adaptation, this unfolds in a garden — gardens, actually. Aside from a young Judi Dench, what more could you want?