Want to get your culture on this weekend? Our top pick is the world premiere of Atlanta playwright Phillip Depoy’s “Edward Foote” at the Alliance Theatre. The Appalachians-set murder mystery features folk songs and a cast that includes (from left), Steve Coulter, Bethany Anne Lind and Lowrey Brown. Photo by Greg Mooney.
RECOMMENDED
Edward Foote. THROUGH APRIL 19. The Alliance Theatre stages the world premiere of this Gothic murder mystery set to Appalachian folk songs and Shape Note singing by award-winning Atlanta writer Phillip DePoy. The cast: Jeremy Aggers (The Whipping Man); Lowery Brown (The Wizard of Oz); Steve Coulter (Aurora’s Underneath the Lintel, among many other credits); Ann Marie Gideon (The Geller Girls); Trevor Goble; Bethany Anne Lind (Carapace); and Hayley Platt (The Tall Girls). Chris Coleman, artistic director of Portland [Ore.] Center Stage and co-founder of Atlanta’s Actor’s Express, directs. $25 and up. 7:30 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday; 8 p.m. Friday; 2:30 + 8 p.m. Saturday; and 2:30 + 7:30 p.m. Sunday. Hertz Stage, Alliance Theatre, Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St. N.E. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.733.5000.
Marcus; or the Secret of Sweet. THROUGH APRIL 26. A young African-American (Terry Guest) discovers his sexual identity in the Louisiana bayou in this piece from the Brothers/Sisters trilogy by multi-award-winning playwright Tarell Alvin McCraney. $26-$45. 8 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday; 2 p.m. Sunday. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.607.7469. Discount tickets at PoshDealz.com. See what’s happening at the Express in 2015-16 in this ENCORE FEATURE. Learn more about Guest in this ENCORE SNAPSHOT. (Pictured, from left, Shon Middlebrooks, Guest and Falashay Pearson. Photo by BreeAnne Clowdus)
OPENING THIS WEEKEND
Damn Yankees. OPENS FRIDAY | THROUGH APRIL 26. This classic American musical puts a spin on the legend of Faust when a diehard Washington Senators baseball fan sells his soul to the devil to help his team beat the damn Yankees and win the pennant. The 1955 original, a Gwen Verdon vehicle, won seven Tony awards including best musical. The 1994 revival with Bebe Neuwirth won one. The score includes “Heart,” “Whatever Lola Wants,” “Six Months Out of Every Year” and many more. $30-$50. 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday; 2 p.m. Sunday. Atlanta Lyric Theatre at the Jennie T. Anderson Theatre, Cobb County Civic Center Complex, 548 S. Marietta Parkway. Details, tickets HERE. Discount tickets at PoshDealz.com …
My Fair Lady. OPENS TONIGHT | THROUGH APRIL 26. Wouldn’t it be loverly? Georgia Ensemble Theatre closes its 22nd season with Lerner and Loewe’s classic take on Shaw’s Pygmalion. You know the players: flower peddler Eliza Doolittle (Pump Boys & Dinettes’ Molly Coyne), stuffy phonetician Henry Higgins (Carey Curtis Smith), Colonel Pickering (William S. Murphey) and lovestruck Freddy Eynsford-Hill (Kyle Brumley). $15-$39. GET at the Roswell Cultural Arts Center, 950 Forrest St., Roswell. Details, tickets HERE or at 770.641.1260. (Pictured: Smith and Coyne as Higgins and Eliza. Photo by Dan Carmody/Studio7)
Real Women Have Curves. OPENS FRIDAY | THROUGH APRIL 26. Five Mexican-American women travel the road of self-discovery in this coming-of-age drama, part of Aurora Theatre’s Teatro del Sol programming. In Spanish with English supertitles. $20-$30. 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday; 2:30 p.m. Sunday. In the Harvel Lab. 128 E. Pike St., Lawrenceville. Free, covered, lighted parking in city deck at 153 E. Crogan St., Lawrenceville. Details, tickets HERE or at 678.226.6222.
Storefront Church. IN PREVIEWS | OPENS SATURDAY. Visit a wintery Bronx, where greedy capitalists devour giant gingerbread houses, a disenchanted preacher rediscovers his faith and a curmudgeonly loan officer experiences a rebirth. This piece concludes Pulitzer Prize- and Tony Award-winning playwright John Patrick Shanley’s Church and State trilogy (Doubt). Featuring a formidable Theatrical Outfit cast led by Tom Key and including Donna Biscoe, Joe Knezevich, Clayton Landey, E. Roger Mitchell and Aurora Theatre’s Anthony Rodriguez. Through April 26. $20-$35. 7:30 p.m. Thursday-Friday; 2:30 + 7:30 p.m. Saturday; and 2:30 p.m. Sunday. The Balzer Theater at Herren’s, 84 Luckie St. N.W. Details, tickets HERE or at 678.528.1500. Discount tickets at PoshDealz.com.
THIS WEEKEND ONLY
Emanuel Ax Plays Mozart. TONIGHT, SATURDAY-SUNDAY. Emanuel Ax, one of the world’s most sought-after soloists, joins the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra for Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 4. Also on the program: Weber’s Overture to Die Freischutz and Schumann’s Symphony No. 4. French conductor Lionel Bringuier is on the podium. $24-$99. Atlanta Symphony Hall, Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St. N.E. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.733.5000.
LAST CHANCE
Marisol. CLOSES SUNDAY. David Crowe (Theatrical Outfit’s recent Silent Sky) directs this comic play — not comedy — from Oscar nominee and Obie Award winner José Rivera. The urban fantasia, set in post-apocalyptic New York, introduces Marisol Perez, a young Puerto Rican whose world is upside down because of a senile, inattentive God. “It’s about the dangers of extreme conservatism and the healing power of acceptance,” says Crowe. The cast, Theater Emory’s usual mix of students and pros, includes Christy Brumfield Baggett, Danielle Deadwyler, Veronika Duerr and Brandon Connor Partrick. $20; $6 students. 7 p.m. Thursday-Saturday; 2 p.m. Sunday. Theater Emory at Emory’s Munroe Theatre in the Dobbs University Center, 605 Asbury Circle. Parking details HERE. Tickets at 404.727.5050.
The Marriage of Figaro. FRIDAY-SUNDAY. Mozart’s famous upstairs-downstairs comedy chases love, infidelity and redemption with servants Figaro and Susanna in the central roles. Stage director Tara Faircloth makes her Atlanta Opera debut. Sung in Italian with English supertitles. $26-$140. 8 p.m. Friday-Saturday; 3 p.m. Sunday. The Atlanta Opera at Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre, 2800 Cobb Galleria Parkway, Atlanta. Details, tickets HERE or at 404.881.8885.
NOW PLAYING
The Explorer’s Club. THROUGH APRIL 19. Aurora Theatre goes madcap with this romp that juxtaposes feminine ideals with the strait-laced backdrop of 19th-century Britain. Courtney Patterson, a Georgia Shakespeare and Alliance Theatre regular, leads the nine-person cast as Phyllida-Spotte Hume. $20-$40. 8 p.m. Wednesday-Friday; 2:30 + 8 p.m. Saturday; and 2:30 p.m. Sunday. Additional show at 10 a.m. April 15 ($16). 128 E. Pike St., Lawrenceville. Free, covered, lighted parking in city deck at 153 E. Crogan St., Lawrenceville. Details, tickets HERE or at 678.226.6222.
Grand Concourse. THROUGH APRIL 26. At Horizon Theatre. This comic-drama, set in an urban soup kitchen, is described as “insightful, with a moving, even shocking epiphany” by the Huffington Post. The cast: Horizon regular Maria Rodriguez-Sager, Allan Edwards, Alexandra Ficken and Evan Cleaver. The playwright is Heidi Schreck (TV’s “Nurse Jackie”). $20-$30. 8 p.m. Wednesday-Friday; 3 + 8:30 p.m. Saturday; and 5 p.m. Sunday. 1083 Austin Ave. N.E. Details, tickets at HERE or at 404.584.7450. (Pictured, from left: Sager, Cleaver and Edwards, seated)
The Wilderness. THROUGH APRIL 19. World premiere. Anytime actor-turned-playwright Theroun D’Arcy Patterson (A Thousand Circlets, That Uganda Play) has something new onstage, it’s worth a look. This piece takes place in the wake of a traumatic event, when three women tumble into a world where the shadows of the past have grown legs, arms and teeth. Note: Contains partial nudity and adult situations. $15; $10 students. 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday; 2 p.m. Sunday. The Fern Theatre at 7 Stages (black box), 1107 Euclid Ave. N.E. Details, tickets HERE.
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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. Please email: kathy@encoreatlanta.com.
