Want to get your culture on this weekend? Our top recommendation is “Silent Sky” at Theatrical Outfit, with Elizabeth Diane Wells as astronomer Henrietta Leavitt and Brandon Partrick as a colleague and potential love interest. Photo by BreeAnne Clowdus.
RECOMMENDED
The C.A. Lyons Project. CLOSES SUNDAY. Winner of the 2015 Alliance/Kendeda National Graduate Playwriting Competition. Playwright Tsehaye Hébert combines dance and theater to tell this 1980s-set story of the ailing founder of an African-American dance company and the three women in his life. Contains brief nudity. $38. 7:30 tonight; 8 p.m. Friday; 2:30 + 8 p.m. Saturday; and 2:30 + 7:30 Sunday. Alliance Theatre, Hertz Stage, Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St. N.E. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.733.5000. For more on the playwright, see this ENCORE FEATURE.
Detroit ’67. CLOSES SUNDAY. It’s 1967 in Detroit, and Motown is the sound. Chelle and brother Lank turn their basement into a late-night hot spot to make ends meet but, as their feelings erupt so does much of Detroit. They’re all in the midst of Motor City’s historic riots. Playwright Dominique Morisseau won a 2014 Kennedy Center award for this piece. True Colors Theatre at the Southwest Arts Center, 915 New Hope Road. Details, tickets HERE or at 877.725.8849. For more, see this ENCORE FEATURE. (Pictured: Tinashe Kajese-Bolden as Chelle and E. Roger Mitchell as Lank. Photo by Josh Lamkin)
Silent Sky. CLOSES SUNDAY. A must-see. Decatur-born, San Francisco-based playwright Lauren Gunderson makes her Theatrical Outfit debut with this luminous script about real-life American astronomer Henrietta Leavitt (1868-1921), who must deal with dismissive male colleagues and family disapproval as she fights to understand the stars. $20-$35. 7:30 p.m. Thursday-Saturday; 2:30 p.m. Sunday. Balzer Theater at Herren’s, 84 Luckie St. N.W. Tickets, details HERE or at 678.528.1500.
TONIGHT ONLY
Mahler’s Fifth. 8 p.m. Principal guest conductor Donald Runnicles is on the podium as the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra performs what Mahler himself described as “this foaming, roaring, raging sea of sound.” Mezzo-soprano Kelley O’Connor joins them for Mahler’s Rückert Lieder. $20-$99. Atlanta Symphony Hall, Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St. N.E. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.733.5000.
THIS WEEKEND ONLY
A World Too Wide. SATURDAY. A celebration of contemporary dance and Baroque-era music, featuring a new work by Sue Schroeder and Amanda K. Miller-Fasshauer with CORE Performance Company. The orchestral score, performed live, features work by Vivaldi, Purcell, Telemann and Handel. $15-$60. 8 p.m. Rialto Center for the Arts, 80 Forsyth St. N.W. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.413.9849.
2015 Symphony Gala Concert With Jason Alexander. SATURDAY. Alexander headlines an evening of music benefiting the orchestra and its education and community engagement programs. Although best known for playing neurotic New Yorker George Costanza on TV’s “Seinfeld,” Alexander is a Tony Award-winning song-and-dance man, earning the honor for playing multiple roles in 1989’s Jerome Robbins’ Broadway. $25-$99. Concert at 7:30 p.m. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.733.5000. For information on attending the full gala, including a black-tie dinner and dancing, visit aso.org/gala. Symphony Hall, Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St. N.E. Concert-only discount tickets at PoshDealz.com.
NOW PLAYING
Homers. THROUGH MARCH 15. A world premiere by Atlanta actor and playwright Jacob York about love and loyalty, fandom and family, in which a female sportswriter must decide if a homer can ever really leave home. $10-$35. 7:30 p.m. Wednesday; 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday; and 2:30 p.m. Sunday. Additional shows at 4 p.m. March 7 + 14. Georgia Ensemble Theatre at the Roswell Cultural Art Center, 950 Forrest St., Roswell. Details, tickets HERE or at 770.641.1260.
LAST CHANCE
Anne Frank: Within and Without. THROUGH SUNDAY. This piece celebrates Anne’s life, acting as a meditation on hope and all that is good in humankind. Told with tabletop and marionette puppets. Recommended for middle and high school students as well as adults. Talkbacks follow every show. $25. 11 a.m. today; 11 a.m. + 8 p.m. Friday; 8 p.m. Saturday; and 5 p.m. Sunday. Center for Puppetry Arts, 1404 Spring St. N.W. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.873.3391. (Pictured: actors Jeffrey Hyman and Caitlin Roe. Photo by Center for Puppetry Arts)
Rigoletto. THROUGH SUNDAY. Verdi’s story of lust, vengeance and sacrifice returns to The Atlanta Opera in a new co-production with the Boston Lyric and Omaha operas. The tragic story revolves around the licentious Duke of Mantua, his hunchbacked court jester Rigoletto and Rigoletto’s beautiful daughter, Gilda. Sung in Italian with English supertitles. $26-$140. 7:30 p.m. Tuesday; 8 p.m. Friday-Saturday; and 3 p.m. Sunday. Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre, 2800 Cobb Galleria Parkway. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.881.8885.
StinkyKids the Musical. THROUGH SUNDAY. Synchronicity and Aurora theaters partner for this family musical based on the Britt Menzies books and characters. The gang plans to visit the new MegaJumper 3000, but the situation gets sticky when Britt wakes up with gum in her hair. $10-$40. 7:30 p.m. Friday; 1 + 4 p.m. Saturday; and 2 + 5 p.m. Sunday. Synchronicity Theatre at Peachtree Pointe, 1545 Peachtree St. N.E. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.484.8636. (Pictured: The cast, from left, Ben Davis, Greg Hunter, Kristin Storla, Alexandra Karr, Lydia Frempong and Luke Georgecink. Photo by KVC Photography)
Wicked. THROUGH SUNDAY. The musical blockbuster nears the end of its three-week run at the Fox Theatre. As you might recall, it’s the story of two girls who met in Oz long before Dorothy dropped in. One, born with emerald-green skin, was smart, fiery and misunderstood. The other was beautiful, ambitious and popular. See how these two unlikely friends became the Wicked Witch of the West and Glinda the Good. $33 and up. 7:30 tonight; 8 p.m. Friday; 2 + 8 p.m. Saturday; and 1 + 6:30 p.m. Sunday. 660 Peachtree St. N.E. Details, tickets HERE or at 855.285.8499.
NEXT WEEK
Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. MARCH 12 + 14. Finnish conductor John Storgards makes his ASO debut on a program that features Argentina’s Ingrid Fliter playing Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 2. Also planned: Rachmaninov’s Symphony No. 2 and An Imaginary Journey to the Faroe Islands by Nielsen. $20-$99. Atlanta Symphony Hall, Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St. N.E. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.733.5000.
Roob and Noob. OPENS MARCH 9 | CLOSES April 4. Meet Roob and Noob, two overly curious scientists who love nothing more than discovering something new. Join their interactive adventure combining science and the arts as part of the Alliance’s Theatre for the Very Young, for ages 18 months to 5 years. Note: No shows March 16-20. $10; under age 1 free. 9:30 + 11 a.m. Monday-Saturday. Alliance Theatre’s Black Box Theatre (third floor), Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St. N.E. Details HERE or at 404.733.5000.
LOOKING AHEAD
Camino Real. MARCH 20-22 ONLY. World premiere. Atlanta Ballet dances a full-evening piece inspired by the 1953 Tennessee Williams play and told from the perspective of Kilroy, a character based on patriotic iconography from World War II. The ballet, choreographed by Helen Pickett, deals with mortality, the desire to connect and the will to live. $23-$124. 8 p.m. Friday; 2 + 8 p.m. Saturday; and 2 p.m. Sunday. Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre, 2800 Cobb Galleria Parkway, Atlanta. Details, tickets HERE or 404.892.3303. Venue info at 770.916.2852.
James and the Giant Peach. MARCH 14-29. Enter a young boy’s wild and surreal world of magic and adventure in this jazzy Broadway-style musical by Tony Award-nominated composer-lyricists Pasek and Paul (A Christmas Story). James, an English orphan, begins to imagine a bright future as he embarks on a journey in a larger-than-life enchanted peach. Rosemary Newcott directs. $20-$35. 1 + 3:30 p.m. Saturday-Sunday. Alliance Theatre mainstage, Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St. N.E. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.733.5000.
The Leopard Tale. MARCH 19-22 ONLY. Ballethnic Dance Company‘s signature ballet revisits the jungle in dramatic, imaginative ways. $42. Rialto Center for the Arts, 80 Forsyth St. N.W. Details HERE, tickets HERE or at 404.413.9849.
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Kathy Janich, Encore Atlanta’s managing editor, has been seeing, working in or writing about the performing arts for most of her life. Full disclosure: She is affiliated with Synchronicity Theatre listed above. Please email: kathy@encoreatlanta.com.
