Take five: “Appropriate” (Actor’s Express), “Proof” (True Colors), “Silent Night” (Atlanta Opera), and “Metropolis” with the Alloy Orchestra and Chucho Valdés/Joe Lovano (both at the Rialto Center). Plus. Much. More. Pictured: A scene from the November 2011 world premiere of “Silent Night” at the Minnesota Opera.
** Indicates an Encore Atlanta fall season best bet
Recommended
** Appropriate. THROUGH NOV. 20. Award-winning playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins gives us a darkly comic domestic drama about the adult children of a deceased Southern patriarch who just might have swung with the KKK. Artistic director Freddie Ashley’s directs an Actor’s Express cast that includes Cynthia Barrett, Alexandra Ficken, Devon Hales, Kevin Stillwell and Joe Sykes. $22-$44. 8 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday; 2 p.m. Sunday. 887 W. Marietta St. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.607.7469. Discount tickets at PoshDealz.com.
[VIDEO: PEEK IN ON “APPROPRIATE’S” DYSFUNCTIONAL LAFAYETTE FAMILY]
** Proof. THROUGH NOV. 26. David Auburn’s 2001 Pulitzer Prize-winning drama earned an acting Tony Award for Mary-Louise Parker and became a middling 2005 feature film with Gwyneth Paltrow. The plot revolves around Catherine (New York’s Fedna Jacquet), the troubled younger daughter of a recently deceased master mathematician. She might have inherited his genius, or his madness. 8 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday; 2:30 p.m. Sunday. True Colors Theatre Company at the Southwest Arts Center, 915 New Hope Road. Details HERE. Tickets HERE or at 877.725.8849.
Silent Night. FRIDAY + SUNDAY ONLY. Atlanta Opera stages the Pulitzer Prize-winning piece about Christmastime 1914, when French, British and German soldiers fighting World War I put down their weapons to share cigarettes and brandy, exchange gifts and play soccer. Based on the Oscar-nominated 2005 film Joyeux Noël. Sung in English, German, French, Italian and Latin with English supertitles. $35 and up. 8 p.m. Friday; 3 p.m. Sunday. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.881.8885.
This weekend only
ASO: Flourish With Fireworks. TONIGHT + SATURDAY. Music director Robert Spano leads the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra in a program featuring Knussen’s Flourish With Fireworks; Scriabin’s Symphony No. 5, Prometheus, Poem of Fire; Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 1; and Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite. ASO concertmaster David Coucheron solos on the Prokofiev. $25-$94. Symphony Hall, Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St. NE. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.733.5000.
Metropolis with the Alloy Orchestra. SATURDAY ONLY. Visionary director Fritz Lang’s 1927 silent film classic is screened at Georgia State University’s Rialto Center for the Arts, accompanied by the three musicians of Boston-born Alloy. The trio —Terry Donahue, Roger C. Miller and Ken Winokur — uses found percussion and state-of-the-art electronics to create a complete soundscape. Lang’s film, still considered one of the most remarkable ever made, portrays a futuristic city sharply divided between the working class and the city planners. $25. 8 p.m. (arrive at 7 p.m. for a pre-show talk by Alessandra Raengo, an associate professor of moving image studies at GSU). 80 Forsyth St. NW. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.413-9849.
No(se)onenowhere. TONIGHT, SATURDAY + SUNDAY. Israeli physical performance master Ofir Nahari brings this popular piece back to 7 Stages for an encore run. It follows the story of Amassan, a white clown trapped in the loneliness of reality. In a fit of imagination he creates a fantastic, poetic universe. $20.50 + up. 8 tonight + Saturday; 5 p.m. Sunday. 1105 Euclid Ave. NE. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.523.7647.
Chucho Valdés and the Joe Lovano Quintet. SUNDAY ONLY. Lovano, a Grammy Award-winning saxophonist, teams with pianist Valdés and other Afro-Cuban musicians at Georgia State University’s Rialto Center for the Arts. The two have shared the legendary Blue Note Records label for years but have never been onstage together. Valdés, a multi-Grammy and Latin Grammy winner, has been an Afro-Cuban jazz innovator for half a century. The post-bop Lovano has recorded more albums on Blue Note than anyone else in history. $35-$70. 7 p.m. 80 Forsyth St. NW. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.413-9849.
Still running
** On the Verge. THROUGH NOV. 20. Subtitled Or the Geography of Learning. The year is 1888, and three female explorers begin a witty and whimsical safari through space and time to a place called Terra Incognita. The New York Times said Eric Overmyer’s 1985 comedy blends “Tom Stoppard’s limber linguistics with the historic overview of a Thornton Wilder.” Atlanta actor Carolyn Cook directs a Georgia Ensemble Theatre cast comprising Keena Redding Hunt, Park Krausen, Michelle Maria Pokopac and Topher Payne. $26-$35. 7:30 p.m. Wednesday; 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday; 2:30 p.m. Sunday. Also at 4 p.m. this Saturday + Nov. 19. Roswell Cultural Arts Center, 950 Forrest St., Roswell. Details, tickets HERE or at 770.641.1260.
Holiday shows (they’re here … )
Christmas Canteen. OPENS NOV. 17 | THROUGH DEC. 23. Back for its 21st year at Aurora Theatre. This original variety show changes annually but always includes physical comedy, holiday favorites, novelty numbers and a few surprises. Performers Lindsay Ricketson Brown, Jen MacQueen, Brandon O’Dell (who wrote the script) and Diany Rodriguez return, joined by newcomers Christian Magby and Cecil Washington Jr. If you want to go, act now: The Canteen always sells out. $30-$65. At 8 p.m. Tuesday-Friday; 2:30 + 8 p.m. Saturday; 2:30 p.m. Sunday. Also at 10 a.m. Dec. 7, 14 + 21 ($20 + up). No shows on Thanksgiving eve or Thanksgiving Day. 128 E. Pike St., Lawrenceville. Free, covered and attached parking in city deck at 153 E. Crogan St. Details, tickets HERE or at 678.226.6222.
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. THROUGH DEC. 31. Rudolph, Clarice, Hermey and Bumble the Abominable Snow Monster all return to the Center for Puppetry Arts for another run. The Jon Ludwig script is based on the Rankin/Bass 1964 stop-motion animated TV special that still airs every season. Told with rod, black light and body puppets. For ages 4 and up. $20.50. 10 + 11:45 a.m. Tuesday-Friday; noon + 2 p.m. Saturday; 1 + 3 p.m. Sunday. No shows Nov. 24, Dec. 25 or Jan. 1. 1404 Spring St. NW. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.873.3089.
Urban Nutcracker. NOV. 18-19. Ballethnic Dance Company’s riff on the Tchaikovsky classic moves the action to Atlanta’s Sweet Auburn Avenue in the 1940s, a neighborhood populated by the Reggae Ragdolls, Arabian dancers, a leaping Black Russian, Mother Spice and her tumbling Spice Drops, the bubbly Coca Cola Pas de Six, the elegant Brown Sugar and her Chocolatier. $30-$40. 8 p.m. Friday; 2 + 8 p.m. Saturday. Riverside EpiCenter, 135 Riverside Parkway, Austell. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.762.1416. (The ballet plays Porter Sanford III Performing Arts Center in Decatur on Dec. 17-18.)
