Theater events: Grade-school teacher turned comedian headlines the Metropolis

After precocious 14-year-old Leonard Pelkey goes missing from his small Jersey Shore town, his optimism and spirit inspire his fellow citizens in “The Absolute Brightness of Leonard Pelkey.” American Blues Theater ensemble member Joe Foust plays every character in James Lecesne's solo play, which begins previews Friday, March 29, at Stage 773, 1225 W. Belmont Ave., Chicago. The show, directed by Kurt Johns, opens Thursday, April 4. (773) 654-3103 or americanbluestheater.com.

Lucas Bohn brings his solo show, “Lucas Bohn's Lesson Plans to Late Night,” chronicling his transition from elementary school teacher to standup comedian, to the Metropolis Performing Arts Centre, 111 W. Campbell St., Arlington Heights. Showtime is 7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 30. (847) 577-2121 or metropolisarts.com.

A new exhibition/performance series held in conjunction with the city's Year of Chicago Theatre celebration titled “goat island archive - we have discovered the performance by making it” opens Saturday, March 30, at the Sidney R. Yates Gallery in the Chicago Cultural Center, 78 E. Washington St., Chicago. Nine national and international performance groups and artists create new works in response to one of the nine original works created by the performance ensemble known as Goat Island, which existed from 1986 through 2006. See cityofchicago.org/dcase.

Theatre at the Center, 1040 Ridge Road, Munster, Indiana, presents “Berenstain Bears Live!” a stage adaptation of Stan and Jan Berenstain's children's books about the adventures of a family of bears. Performances are at 10 a.m., noon and 2 p.m. Saturday, March 30. (219) 836-3258 or theatreatthecenter.com.

Oscar, Tony and Grammy Award-winning composer Alan Menken (“Little Shop of Horrors,” “Beauty and the Beast,” “The Little Mermaid”) performs at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 30, at the Auditorium Theatre, 50 E. Ida B. Wells Drive, Chicago. The show, “A Whole New World of Alan Menken,” features Menken playing his songs and telling stories about them and his storied career. (312) 341-2300 or auditoriumtheatre.org.

First Flight presents a staged reading of “The Masque of Queens,” a 1954 play by Maxwell Anderson and the third in his trilogy consisting of “Mary of Scotland” and “Elizabeth the Queen.” In the play, the aging Elizabeth is tormented after condemning Lord Essex to death. The 6 p.m. Sunday, March 31, performance is a benefit for Season of Concern, which assists needy theater artists. It takes place at iO Theater, 1501 N. Kingsbury St., Chicago. (312) 929-2401 or ioimprov.com.

The North American tour of off-Broadway's “Cruel Intentions: The '90s Musical” comes to the Broadway Playhouse at Water Tower Place, 175 E. Chestnut St., Chicago, for a brief run beginning Tuesday, April 2. Based on the 1999 film about stepsiblings Sebastian and Kathryn's plots to corrupt both the new headmaster's daughter and a new student, the jukebox tuner includes such 1990s tunes as The Verve's “Bittersweet Symphony” and Christina Aguilera's “Genie in a Bottle.” It runs through April 14. (800) 775-2000 or broadwayinchicago.com.

Neo-Futurist ensemble member Ida Cuttler performs “Comfortable Shoes,” a 16-hour, experimental, one-woman show from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m. Wednesday, April 3, at 5153 N. Ashland Ave., Chicago. In a nod to the structure of “One Thousand and One Nights,” Cuttler will spend 1001 minutes telling one story per minute for the duration of the show “equipped with nothing except size 8½ running shoes.” Tickets are $8. See neofuturists.org.

Mentalist Mark Toland debuts as the new artist-in-residence at the Chicago Magic Lounge, 5050 N. Clark St., Chicago. Performances of Toland's “Mind Reader” begin at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 3. (312) 366-4500 or chicagomagiclounge.com.

Emerald City Theatre hosts its Read More, Be More: A Celebration of Arts and Literacy fundraising gala on Wednesday, April 3, at Theater on the Lake, 2401 N. Lake Shore Drive, Chicago. ABC 7 anchor Karen Jordan hosts the event, which includes food, entertainment and civic award presentations. See emeraldcitytheatre.com.

Corn Productions presents “Rezoned: Sketches From the Twilight” - an affectionate sendup of Rod Serling's “The Twilight Zone” series - beginning Thursday, April 4, and running through May 4 at the Cornservatory, 4210 N. Lincoln Ave., Chicago. See cornservatory.org.

Performances begin Thursday, April 4, for On The Spot Theatre Company's premiere of “Called Home By the Sea.” Written and directed by Mike Brayndick, the 1950s-set romance is about single mother Molly who takes a job in a town outside of London after her 12-year-old daughter Annie gets into some mischief in London. There they encounter an innkeeper taken with Molly and a reclusive old woman who befriends Annie. See onthespottheatrecompany.weebly.com.

Thompson Street Opera Company presents a double bill that includes: “The Hat: Arendt Meets Heidegger,” by composer Karen Siegel and librettist Zsuzsanna Ardo, about the lives of philosophers Hannah Arendt and Martin Heidegger. The second production is the farcical “The Man Who Woke Up” by composer/librettist Robin Haigh, about a man who wakes up as a character in an opera. Performances run Thursday through Sunday, April 4-7, at The Athenaeum Theatre, Studio 2, 2936 N. Southport Ave., Chicago. Music director Alexandra Enyart conducts and founder/artistic director Claire Divizio directs. See athenaeumtheatre.org.

Windy City Playhouse has extended its hit revival of Michael Frayn's backstage farce “Noises Off,” about a hapless British theater company whose members' production of a sex farce becomes increasingly outrageous as the lives of its cast and crew begin to spin out of control. Performances run through May 12 at 3014 W. Irving Park Road, Chicago. (773) 891-8985 or windycityplayhouse.com.

First Folio Theatre offers U.S. military personnel, veterans and spouses and children of service members $10 off tickets to its productions including the current show “The Firestorm,” a political drama by Meridith Friedman that opens Saturday, March 30, at Mayslake Peabody Estate, 1717 31st St., Oak Brook. (630) 986-067 or firstfolio.org.

Earlier this month, Porchlight Music Theatre announced the launch of the Rachel Rockwell Memorial Fund recognizing female-identifying theater artists in leadership positions in Chicago-area music theater. The fund is named for the late director/choreographer and multiple Joseph Jefferson Award winner. This year's inaugural honorees include lighting designer Denise Karczewski, choreographer Shanna Vanderwerker and music director Christie Chiles Twillie.

In other theater news, Remy Bumppo Theatre Company named Ian Frank as its new associate artistic director. He will be responsible for the day-to-day artistic-related duties and serve as company manager.

Playwright/screenwriter Carson Grace Becker, who launched her career at Chicago Dramatists in the 1990s, has been named the company's new artistic director.

Sideshow Theatre Company welcomed new artistic associates Melissa Duprey, Helen Joo Lee and Regina Victor. The company also announced the playwrights selected for its annual The Freshness Initiative, the new play development program now in its fifth year. They include: Aurora Real de Asua, Philip Dawkins and Calamity West.

The Clown School, a Los Angeles-based studio that teaches clowning and physical theater, announced it will expand to Chicago, Annapolis, Maryland, and Lorton, Virginia, beginning this year. Director/producer Jeremy Aluma will teach classes at the Chicago branch.

Porchlight Music Theatre opens its 25th main stage season Oct. 11 with a revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber's “Sunset Boulevard,” starring Hollis Resnik as faded silent-movie star Norma Desmond who seeks one last starring role. That's followed by the Duke Ellington revue “Sophisticated Ladies” (Jan. 24-March 7, 2020). The main stage season concludes with the Chicago-area premiere of “Freaky Friday, A New Musical,” based on the film about a teenage girl who switches bodies with her mother. It runs April 10 to May 24, 2020. The company's Porchlight Revisits series showcasing rarely produced tuners includes Irvin Berlin and Howard Lindsay's sendup of foreign diplomacy “Call Me Madam” (Nov. 20-21). The season also includes The Ruffians' remount of its holiday favorite “Burning Bluebeard” (Dec. 13-28), along with regular installments of the company's New Faces Sing Broadway series. Performances take place at the Ruth Page Center for the Arts, 1016 N. Dearborn St., Chicago. Current subscribers can renew subscriptions while new subscribers can purchase subscriptions beginning April 10. Single tickets go on sale June 3. (773) 777-9884 or porchlightmusictheatre.org.

A two-night event on May 5 and 6 at Under the Gun Theater, 956 W. Newport Ave., Chicago, marks the start of Brown Paper Box Co.'s 2019-2020 season. Titled Holding On: A Community Cabaret, the event includes performances by company members and friends. The Midwest premiere of “Grace, or the Art of Climbing,” by L.M. Feldman, follows on June 6 at Stage 773, 1225 W. Belmont Ave., Chicago. The play centers on a woman who grapples with depression by embracing competitive rock climbing. The season concludes with “Come Rain or Come Shine: A Judy Garland Cabaret” on Sept. 20 and 21 at Mary's Attic, 5400 N. Clark St., Chicago. The production unfolds as a salute to the film star as well as a celebration of the advance of the LGBTQ movement over the last 50 years. See brownpaperbox.org for ticket information.

Chicago Opera Theater's 2019-2020 season begins Nov. 16 and 17 with a double bill that includes “Everest,” an opera by Joby Talbot and Gene Scheer inspired by the disastrous 1996 expedition during which eight climbers died in a storm. It's paired with “Aleko,” an opera by composer Sergei Rachmaninoff and librettist Vladimir Nemirovech Danchenko about a Russian man who abandons society to join a group of Romani gypsies. Those performances take place at the Harris Theater for Music and Dance, 205 E. Randolph St., Chicago. Next up is “Freedom Ride” (Feb. 8, 14 and 16, 2020, at the Studebaker Theater, 410 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago). A new commission by Dan Shore, it's set in 1961 and centered on a college student who has to choose between her academic future and joining the Freedom Riders from the Congress of Racial Equality. The season concludes with David T. Little's “Soldier Songs” (May 14-17, 2020, at the Museum of Contemporary Art, 220 E. Chicago Ave., Chicago). It's a solo work chronicling the experiences of a soldier deployed to Afghanistan over various phases of his life. Subscriptions range from $95 to $450 and are available at (312) 704-8414 or online at cot.org.