on stage
Artists Repertory Theatre presents The Retreat
frOm Moscow, a nuanced tale of domestic heart
break about a quiet history teacher who wants out of his
34-year marriage to a theatrical poet, through April 29. Old
pros Keith Scales and JoAnn Johnson, together with new
comer Alex Moggridge, craft a particular elegance from the
intimate, real-time moments of this private tragedy. Little
new is revealed, but there are unspoken truths. (Call for
times. 1516 SW Alder St. $15-$42 50 from 503-241-1278.)
Arts Equity presents The Long Voyage Home, Eugene
O'Neill's four one-acts about an ethnically diverse group of
sailors, through April 22. (7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday,
2 pm April 22. 606 Main St., Vancouver, Wash. $8-$24
from 360-695-3770.)
Blue Monkey Theater Company presents The Wrestling
Season, an intense physical and emotional play set within
the powerful arena of high school wrestling, where eight
students struggle with the destructive power of rumors,
through April 7 at West End Theater. (7 pm. 1220 SW
Taylor St $10-$20 from 503-777-4506.)
The Bluestockings presents Other Women, gay
playwright Jonn Jorgensen's stage monologues
celebrating fascinating, frank, funny and furious females
who defy convention, extended through April 15 at Theater
Theatre. What works so well here is how refreshingly
underplayed these sophisticated women's monologues
are, each delivered with tender restraint rooted in one-to-
one reality with a strong sense of feminine individuality.
(Call for times. 3430 SE Belmont St. $12-$ 15 from
503-274-9309; Thursdays are “pay what you will.")
The Bluestockings presents The Fall of the
House, a serialized soap opera with ongoing bi
and lesbian storylines, with a new episode each week
through April 14 at Theater Theatre. Like a good soap
opera, this theater of the ad lib is addictive. Individually,
everything's fairly collegiate with a semi-scripted pace
that's sometimes stop-and-go. But collectively, a cast of
fresh faces delivers engaging characters with honest
emotions and spontaneous charm. Here’s hoping the
series gets picked up for another season. (9:30 pm
Thursdays, 10:30 pm Fridays and Saturdays. 3430 SE
Belmont St. $10 from 503-274-9309; Thursdays are “pay
what you will. “)
BroadArts Theatre presents a quirky urban-folk rock 'n'
roll musical spiraling around 40 WonderBroads: The Babes
and Broads Who Broke the Rules April 13-May 5 at Rose
City Park Presbyterian Church. (8 pm Friday and Saturday,
2 pm Sunday. 1907 NE 45th Ave. $18-$22 from
503-288-5181.)
Duke Productions presents Gonzo—A Brutal
Chrysalis, a raw, unflinching and intimate look at
the life of Hunter S. Thompson during the critical
and catalytic years between 1968 and 1971,
April 18-28 at various venues. (Call for times and
locations. $10-$ 15 from www.gonzoduke.com.)
Ferris Wheel Productions presents The Star-
Spangled Girl, Neil Simon's hilarious play about
two young educated roommates who struggle
earnestly to publish a liberal political magazine
with a beautiful blond conservative from the South
living next door, through April 21 at Interstate
Firehouse Cultural Center. (Call for times. 5340 N
Interstate Ave. $21 at the door, $17 in advance
from 503-616-4791.)
Hand2Mouth Theatre presents Repeat After Me,
one part karaoke sing-along gone wrong, one part
dance theater and one part nightmare to get at
the heart of what it means to be an American,
April 12-29 at Goldsmith Performance Lab. (8 pm
Thursday-Sunday. 20 NW Fifth Ave $10-$ 15 slid
ing scale from 503-235-5284.)
Imago Theatre ends the 20-year run of Frogz,
perhaps the most famous show to originate from
Oregon, through April 29. (Call for times. 17 SE
Eighth Ave. $16-$27 from 503-231-9581.)
A son plays scorekeeper, goalpost and referee between his fending parents in The Retreat from Moscow
through April 29 at Artists Rep.
Lakewood Theatre Company presents
Arcadia, Tom Stoppard's play about a country
house's mysterious links to poet Lord Byron, through April
7. More than three hours of poky trivial erudition, rather
than sprightly mind-bending detective games. (Call for
times. 368 S State St., Lake Oswego. $23-$25 from
503-635-3901.)
Lirninal Performance Group presents The Theory of Love,
a traveling multimedia lecture opera proving conclusively
that everyone's favorite emotion is more than mere hypoth
esis, April 13-29 at various venues. (8 and 10 pm Friday and
Saturday, 8 pm Sunday. Call for locations. $8 $ 15 sliding
scale from 503-890-2993 or www liminalgroup.org.)
Minh Tran ft Company presents Forgotten Memories, the
gay choreographer's fusion of traditional Asian and con
temporary Western techniques, through April 7 at Wonder
Ballroom. (7:30 pm Friday, 7:30 and 9 pm Saturday. 128 NE
Russell St. $20-$22 from box office or Ticketmaster)
Miracle Theatre Group presents Rosalba y los Llaveros,
a Spamsh-language comedy of manners in which a defi
ant young woman tries to "liberate" her cousins from
their provincial lives, through April 28. English superti-
________________ i
ties at all shows except opening
night and Saturdays. (7:30 pm
Thursday, 8 pm Friday and
Saturday,
2
pm
Sunday.
Thursday, Friday and Sunday
starting April 8. 525 SE Stark
St. $15-$ 18 from 503-236-7253.)
’ New Century Players presents
Fatal Passage, a dinner theater
murder mystery aboard a trans-
Atlantic ocean liner, April 20-28 at
The Ainsworth House. Formal
dress encouraged. (6:30pm Friday
and Saturday 19130 Lot Whitcomb
Drive, Oregon City. $40 from
503-367-2620.)
Hollywood Theatre screens an early concert from The B-52's on
April 18.
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Northwest Children's Theater
presents William Shakespeare's
The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet
through April 15 at Northwest
Neighborhood Cultural Center. (Call
for times. 1819 NW Everett St. $16-
$20 from 503-222-4480.)
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PassinArt: A Theatre Company presents Medal of Honor
Rag, an absorbing play that provides a view into what
happens when many of our brave men and women return
from war and seek help to move on with their lives,
through April 14 at CoHo Theater. (8 pm Friday-Sunday.
2257 NW Raleigh St. $17 at the door, $12-$15 in advance
from 503-321-5163.)
Portland Center Stage presents Fences, August Wilson's
Pulitzer and Tony winner exploring the African-American
experience in mid-20th century America, April 13-May 6
in Gerding Theater at the Armory. (Call for times. 128 NW
11th Ave. $28-$59.50 from 503-445-3700.)
Portland Center Stage presents Bad Dates, a one-woman
show about a single working mother who manages an
upscale Manhattan restaurant and decides to start dating
again, April 20-June 10 in Gerding Theater at the Armory.
(Call for times 128 NW 11th Ave $21.50-$41.50 from
503-445-3700.)
Portland Opera's Broadway Across America presents
The Light in the Piazza, a musical set in the summer of
1953 about a North Carolina woman's determined efforts
to prevent her daughter's romance with a high-spirited
Florentine, April 10-15 at Keller Auditorium. (Call for times
222 SW Clay St. $23-$70 from Ticketmaster.)
Portland Story Theater presents Always Say Yes!—
a collection of stories about going with the flow, staying open
to possibilities and embracing life as it comes to us- -through
April 14 at Brooklyn Bay Performance Space. (8 pm Friday
and Saturday 1825 SE Franklin St. $15 from 503-793-5484;
includes one complimentary beverage and light snacks.)
Profile Theatre Project continues its Wendy
Wasserstein
season
with
The
Sisters
Rosensweig, a night of bickering and bonding among
siblings on a search for love, self-definition and fulfill
ment—whether it's with a gay man, as a Jewish woman
in a WASP world or by seeking out a pair of designer
heels—through April 22 at Theater Theatre. This is a well-
crafted, polished production with a comforting sheen of
tradition reflecting the hard lessons of happiness and
fulfillment. Performances are compassionate, maturely
drawn—and often very funny—from a uniformly generous
and keenly composed ensemble (especially Barbara Kerr's
genuinely complex Sara and Shelly Lipkin's disarming
Mervyn, not to mention Leif Norby strutting around in
eating o ut
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boxers). (8 pm Thursday-Saturday, 2 pm Sunday. 3430 SE
Belmont St. $10-$28 from 503-242-0080 )
Profile Theatre Project continues its Wendy
Wasserstein season with a staged reading of Old
Money, a farcical look at the past and present as old and
new money collide in a historic Manhattan townhouse,
April 8-18 at Theater Theatre. (7 pm Sunday-Wednesday.
3430 SE Belmont St. $10-$15 from 503-242-0080.)
Readers Theatre Repertory imports original one-acts with
New Plays from the New South April 13 and 14 at Blackfish
Gallery. (8 pm. 420 NW Ninth Ave $8 from 503-295-4997 )
Readers Theatre Repertory presents the West Coast
premiere of Address Unknown, the story of a German
Jew and a German gentile separated by an ocean, divid
ed by world politics and devastated by moral choices,
April 20-29 at Brunish Hall. (Call for times. 1111 SW
Broadway. $11.50-$23.50 from TicketsWest.)
Slocum House Theatre presents Vanities, a bittersweet
comedy that chronicles the divergent lives of three Texas
girls, April 20-May 13. (8 pm Friday and Saturday. 4 pm
Sunday 605 Esther St, Vancouver, Wash $8$ 10 from
360-696-2427.)
Third Eye Theatre presents Sam Shepherd's
Pulitzer Prize-winning Buried Child, through
April 14 at Back Door Theatre. Like its Midwestern
gothic storyline, this production has traces of hope, but
Shepherd's underlying tension is thinned and the tone is
flat. What's missing is compulsion: What ties these
people here and now, saying what they're saying—or,
more importantly, forcing them to remain silent and
immobile? (8 pm Thursday-Saturday, 2 pm Sunday.
4319 SE Hawthorne Blvd. $15$ 18 from 503-970-8874 )
The Tragedies Theatre Company presents Beyond the
Fringe, a legendary British comedy revue featuring
sketches about capital punishment, schmaltzy World
War II propaganda, stupid people in the media, royalty,
Shakespeare and weapons of mass destruction, April
12-May 5 at Village Ballroom. (8 pm Thursday-Saturday.
700 NE Dekum St. $10 from 503-367-2100, opening
night is “pay what you will.")
Reviewed hy T imothy K rause or W inston
GOODBODY. Read more and comment at
followspot. blogspot .com.
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