STAGE PICK

'Cats' are in town

Normal cats with nine lives have nothing on the long-running kitties of Cats. The record-setting, Tony Award-winning musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber (based on T.S. Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats) has been touring for 25 years, and this weekend it's back in South Florida at Miami's Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, 1300 Biscayne Blvd. Performances are 2 and 7:30 p.m. Friday-Sunday. Tickets are $25-$61. For information, call the Arsht Center at 305-949-6722 or...

THEATER REVIEW

Looks like child's play -- it's not

Post-college life gets a children's TV spin in a Tony-winning musical meant for adults.

THEATER REVIEW

GableStage's 'Adding Machine' a dramatic musical

For his second-ever musical at GableStage in the Biltmore Hotel, director Joseph Adler has chosen a piece based on a play that was written three years before the stately Coral Gables hotel opened in 1926.

CRITIC'S PICK

People and puppets of 'Avenue Q' hit Broward

The Tony Award-winning Avenue Q returns to South Florida, this time for a two-week run at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts beginning Tuesday. The people-and-puppet stars of this Sesame Street-style grown-up show include, from left, Maggie Lakis, Nicky, David Benoit, Rod and Robert McClure. The musical runs through Jan. 11 at the Broward Center, 201 SW Fifth Ave., Fort Lauderdale. Performances are 8 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, 2 p.m. Saturday-Sunday (additional shows at 7:30 p.m...

CRITIC'S PICK

'Adding Machine' looks at hard times

From Elmer Rice's 1923 Expressionist play comes an of-the-moment musical about a man thrown out of work after 25 years of dutiful if unfulfilling service. Oscar Cheda plays the long-suffering Zero, Maribeth Graham his nagging Mrs. in the Joshua Schmidt-Jason Loewith musical, Adding Machine, at GableStage. The show begins Saturday and runs through Jan. 25, with performances at 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday, 2 and 7 p.m. Sunday. Tickets are $42.50 Friday-Saturday and Sunday matinee, $37.50...

THEATER REVIEW | ADDING MACHINE

GableStage's vintage musical feels eerily of-the-moment

In his decade as the artistic director of Miami-Dade County's most celebrated small theater company, Joseph Adler has done just one musical: James Joyce's The Dead. The production won GableStage the 2002 Carbonell Award for best musical, but Adler since has stuck largely with the provocative dramatic fare he prefers.

The year in review: Theater

Fine productions by many theaters in three counties, losses and near misses, dramatic highs and lows: All marked the year in South Florida theater.

THEATER REVIEW

Gay play wonders: What if God was one of us?

Paul Rudnick delivers a different holiday story, serving up biblical tales from a gay point of view.

CRITIC'S PICK

Rising Action recasts Biblical stories with gay twist

What if, instead of humanity beginning with Adam and Eve, the first couple had been named Adam and Steve? What if Cain and Abel were actually Jane and Mabel? Though it might seem sacrilegious to some, playwright Paul Rudnick imagines just such a scenario in The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told, the holiday production from Oakland Park's Rising Action Theatre. Featuring Martica DeCardenas, Emily Ocheltree, Ricardo Rodriguez and Larry Fields, the show goes on through Jan. 18 at Rising Action...

THEATER REVIEW

Fine, not magical, debut for Unhinged Theatre

Few playwrights mix everyday life and magical realism the way that José Rivera does. The work of this artful, award-winning playwright is too seldom done in South Florida, so the fact that the new Unhinged Theatre has chosen a Rivera play for its inaugural production is a good thing (unless you're affiliated with the Alliance Theatre Lab, which had earlier announced a January production of the same play).

THEATER REVIEW | MEZZULAH, 1946

You-go-girl tale at Florida Stage is sweetly quirky

Like the work by artist Kathleen Holmes in the hallway gallery outside Florida Stage's performance space, Michele Lowe's Mezzulah, 1946 is a thing of delicacy and strength, theatrical art that embraces the everyday and the unexpected.

THEATER COMMENTARY

Playhouse poised for small-scale comeback

More than 2 ˝ years after the Coconut Grove Playhouse abruptly shut down during its 50th anniversary season, the theater's board of directors has revealed specific plans for getting the historic theater's doors open again.

CRITIC'S PICK

She's come a long way in 'Mezzulah, 1946'

After World War II, American soldiers returned home to reclaim jobs from the women who had worked while their men were off defending freedom. But in Michele Lowe's Mezzulah, 1946, one young woman isn't about to sacrifice her dreams or her job to take a step backward. Theo Allyn portrays the determined title character in the play at Florida Stage, 262 S. Ocean Blvd., Manalapan, through Jan. 19. Performances are 8 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday, 7 p.m. Sunday, 2 p.m. Wednesday and Saturday-Sunday...

Coconut Grove Playhouse expected to return as smaller theater

The Coconut Grove Playhouse board unveils a plan for building a single smaller theater, a development deal and a larger pool of artistic partners.

THEATER REVIEW

'Gutenberg' is a bad idea that gets worse

Not all two-man musicals are created equal, as the latest effort from Actors' Playhouse demonstrates.

Carbonells: The show is back on

Reversing a decision that stirred South Florida's sometimes-contentious theater community to action, the board of directors of the Carbonell Awards voted Friday to continue the awards during 2009.

CRITIC'S PICK

'Gutenberg! The Musical!' a musical comedy frenzy

Working themselves into a musical comedy frenzy, Wayne LeGette and Francisco Padura play a couple of guys with a show to sell in Gutenberg! The Musical! To find backers for their Broadway dreams, the two portray all the characters in a musical about the inventor of the printing press (that would be Johannes Gutenberg, of course). They hold forth at Actors' Playhouse, 280 Miracle Mile, Coral Gables, through Jan. 4. Performances are 8 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday. Tickets...

THEATER REVIEW | ANNIE

Betcha nobody gets enough of this

The award-winning musical about a red-haired orphan and the billionaire who changes her life returns as a resonant holiday treat.

THEATER REVIEW

Shakespeare done for laughs

A speedy version of the Shakespearean canon is anything but stuffy as the Reduced Shakespeare Company does its thing at the Arsht Center.

Time for a little humbug

While the world of dance has The Nutcracker, theater has A Christmas Carol as its most-produced holiday show. Some large cities have dueling versions, but this season in South Florida, Actors' Playhouse has the major production of the Charles Dickens classic.

CRITIC'S PICK

All the Bard's plays, boiled down to 97 minutes

Reed Martin and Austin Tichenor are smart, funny guys who don't think you have to be a scholar or sit for several hours to enjoy the work of William Shakespeare. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged) [revised] is all about proving that thesis, as the two perform all 37 of the Bard's plays (at least a bit of each) in 97 minutes. The show runs through Jan. 18 in the Carnival Studio Theater at...

THEATER REVIEW | ENTER LAUGHING

Season opens with big showbiz dreams

Avi Hoffman's New Vista Theatre Company has just kicked off its season with a musical that is, as they say in the wedding biz, something old and something new.

THEATER

Players cut Shakespeare down to size

Reed Martin and Austin Tichenor appreciate the works of the greatest playwright the English language has ever produced (OK, arguably the greatest) as much as any Bard-besotted scholar. But that doesn't mean that either man believes the plays of William Shakespeare need to be done reverently. Or even as written.

THEATER REVIEW | THE SEAFARER

A booze-soaked fable for an extraordinary evening

It is the morning of Christmas Eve, but despite the presence of a sad little tree adorned with tiny lights, the chilly stone house that two grown brothers share is anything but festive.

THEATER REVIEW | JOE TURNER'S COME AND GONE

M Ensemble struggles with August Wilson's challenging script

North Miami's M Ensemble Company continues its exploration of August Wilson's work with Joe Turner's Come and Gone, one of the most challenging scripts in the late playwright's celebrated 10-play ``Pittsburgh Cycle.''

THEATER

Mosaic's creator started with a dream

Richard Jay Simon is a gambler. Not the kind who spends every spare hour in a casino, though he's good enough that he once played in the World Series of Poker, and he has a Fantasy Football team in a league with other South Florida theater types.

THEATER REVIEW

Magical car flies off with 'Chitty Chitty Bang Bang' show

W.C. Fields famously turned up his bulbous nose at working with scene-stealing children and dogs. If he were still around to be cast in the show that has just opened at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts, he'd have something else to add to his professional enemies list: a flying car.

CRITIC'S PICK

'The Seafarer' goes to Christmas Eve in Dublin

In Conor McPherson's The Seafarer, friends and relatives gather for cards, booze, stories and an old-fashioned scare on Christmas Eve in Dublin. Dennis Creaghan, John Felix, Gregg Weiner, Christian Rockwell and Ken Clement star in the recent Broadway hit at Mosaic Theatre, 12200 W. Broward Blvd., Bldg. 3000, Plantation. The show runs through Dec. 14, with performances at 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday, 3 p.m. Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday. Tickets are $35 ($29 for seniors 65 and older, $15 for...

THEATER

Child's plays: But adults like them, too

Already this season, families have journeyed to Oz together. This week and next, they'll watch a special car take wing to rescue an old man from some family-phobic villains. And soon they'll be able to see the return of a red-haired orphan, a collection of singing cats, athletic performers leading them on a jungle adventure.