Eugene Weekly : Bravo : 9.25.08

Bravo! EW’s Fall Guide to Performing Arts

 

What’s On
Theater scene, down a company, moves on
by Suzi Steffen

You’ve got two weeks’ worth of latte money saved up for a Eugene theater performance. So what should you go see?

First, everyone’s still sifting through last year’s shakeout, with no more Willamette Rep on tap. The UO’s Miller Complex remains under construction and opens in January, though graduate student productions will run in the Pocket Theatre in October and November. 

Last year’s powerful Pillowman at the Leebrick

That said, here are a few highlights (and we’ll write about more in our Holiday Happenings and January BRAVO issues) to ink onto your planner. 

For serious plays, there’s no better place in Eugene than the Lord Leebrick Theatre. Topping last season’s stunners like I Am My Own Wife will be tough, but expert director Carol Horne Dennis begins the season Sept. 26 with John Patrick Shanley’s multiple award-winning (and multiply perspectived) Doubt: A Parable. Surprisingly, the Leebrick turns amusing with Rob Urbanati’s Oscar Wilde-based West Moon Street, opening Nov. 14. 

LCC’s Student Pro-ductions Association attacks yet another Shakespeare, the complex and spectacularly odd A Winter’s Tale, in which is written the immortal direction “Exit, pursued by bear” (opening Oct. 2). Never a group to shy from the classics — and sticking with the vivid imagery theme — SPA tackles Aristophanes’ comedy The Birds, beginning Nov. 6. 

The Actors Cabaret of Eugene’s Tell Me (reviewed in the regular paper) kicks off a busy few months for the theater, including the well-beloved Rocky Horror Show opening Oct. 30 and R-G theater critic Dorothy Velasco’s Pigs in Love opening Nov. 14. The Very Little Theatre opens its landmark 80th season Oct. 17 with the amusing Funny Money and slots in some cruelly hilarious David Mamet with Glengarry Glen Ross in Stage Left, opening Dec. 5. 

Moving away from the center of Eugene, Cottage Theatre gets heavy with A Streetcar Named Desire, opening Oct. 3. OSU revives The Mikado on Oct. 3, and Corvallis Community Theatre hits serious notes both with The Exonerated (Sept. 26-27 in the Corvallis High School’s gorgeous theater) and the lighter but still smart State of the Union, opening just in time for the election on Oct. 24. Don’t forget to head down to Ashland for the last few performances on the Elizabethan Stage (Othello closes Oct. 10, Our Town Oct. 11 and Comedy of Errors Oct. 12) or the spectacular Clay Cart, fine View from the Bridge or wild Midsummer Night’s Dream in the Bowmer through early November. 

Spinning the On-Ramp Playing it by ear at KWAX with Caitriona Bolster 

What’s On Theater scene, down a company, moves on

Loves Music, Loves to Dance Fall offerings leap off the page

Calendar Listings