Once the Fourth of July has passed, we officially move into a new theater season. But it takes some time to build up a head of steam for 2017-18. There aren’t any “mainstream” productions this weekend, but several onstage items might be of interest to theatergoers.
Final performances of Dr. Seuss’ The Cat in the Hat by the Children’s Theatre of Cincinnati are Saturday (noon and 5 p.m.) and Sunday (2 and 4 p.m.). This has been a month-long offering — the first time ever — at TCTC’s new facility on Red Bank Road. Good entertainment for the kids. Tickets: 800-745-3000.
For the grownups, you might check out Cincinnati Opera’s production of Frida, a very adult story about avant-garde painter Frida Kahlo. One last performance happens Saturday evening at 7:30 p.m. at the Aronoff Center’s Jarson-Kaplan Theater. The performance is sung in English and Spanish with projected English translations. The production is rated R for sexuality, nudity and drug references. Tickets: 513-241-2742.
On Monday evening at 7:30 p.m. the sparks will be flying at Know Theatre (1120 Jackson St. Over-the-Rhine) for the final quarterly offering of TrueTheatre’s 2016-17 season of themed personal tales. The program’s focus is trueFIRE, with speakers telling how fire can lead to loss or gain, how it can run out of control and how it can be tamed. One of Monday’s storytellers is radio personality Jay Gilbert. Tickets: 513-300-5669.
A bit of news: New Edgecliff Theatre announced its 20th-anniversary season last week, to be presented at Hoffner Hall (4120 Hamilton Ave., Northside). It’s a great collection of highly theatrical shows: Terrence McNally’s Master Class (Oct. 5-21, 2017) about aging diva Maria Callas; David Ives’ Venus in Fur (Feb. 15-March 3, 2018), about an audition that brings an ambitious director more than he bargained for; and David Mamet’s A Life in the Theatre (April 12-28, 2018), about two actors, one young and one old, exploring the cycle of work and life in and out of the theater. More information: newedgecliff.com.
Rick Pender’s STAGE DOOR blog appears here every Friday. Find more theater reviews and feature stories here.
This article appears in Jul 5-12, 2017.
