The concept of Bunny Gumbo’s Combat Theatre, which is nearing the end of its first decade, is well established to those familiar with local theater. A few playwrights get together and create 16 short plays in 48 hours from topics and settings chosen at random; those plays are then performed in a one-time-only event for curious audiences. Sleep is lost. Exhaustion sets in. Things get weird. Last January someone from the Blue Man Group showed up onstage.

Casting an unwavering gaze at the darker side of human nature, Joe Orton’s Entertaining Mr. Sloane was a critical hit when it was first staged in London in 1964. Its original run only lasted a few performances, but it left enough of a mark to become an enduring work by a very short-lived playwright. The story of a young drifter’s interactions with his landlady, her brother and father presented contemporary middle-class society as remarkably ugly and dysfunctional. Running through June 1, Off The Wall’s presentation of the play is impressively uneven, but well worth a sidelong, prurient glance from the morbidly curious . . .

Sunset Playhouse tackles a tough challenge with its latest production, The Boys Next Door. Written in 1985, the play attempts to raise awareness of issues faced by the cognitively disabled. Often, this type of “message” play is long on exposition and short on entertainment. The Sunset production, however, manages to balance both elements quite well. Credit goes to director Mark Salentine for keeping the show on task throughout its two-and-a-half-hour running time.

For young Percy Talbott and the folks of Gilead, Wisconsin life is not a physical journey out of the small town. In their case, it’s a new way of looking at life within as they rediscover all that’s good about their close knit community. It takes an outsider like Percy to show the insiders where the dormant joys lie buried, waiting to be rediscovered. And life in Gilead centers around The Spitfire Grill, the homey diner crossroads where everyone knows, or tries to know, one another’s business. Based on the 1996 film of the same name, the stage musical version tells the story of Talbott . . .

Over the years, A Midsummer Night’s Dream has proven to be one of Shakespeare’s most popular plays—and now it’s about to be shown at two outdoor theaters in Wisconsin. Next week, the Bard’s classic makes it to the outdoor stage of the American Players Theatre (APT) in Spring Green. A month later, Door Shakespeare will launch its own staging.

What do you do when you lose your one true love? With five well-defined female characters (plus two goofy men), a soundtrack of cuddly Beatles tunes, and the plot of a Lifetime channel movie, To Gillian on Her 37th Birthday, performed last weekend by Soulstice Theatre, has all the elements of a perfect chick play. David, a former college teacher, has been living in an island cottage purchased with the settlement from his wife’s tragic demise two years ago.

In the intimate Alchemist Theatre located on Kinnickinnic Avenue in Bay View, Pink Banana Theatre Company finds a home—one that “encourages new and emerging artists to focus on their artistic crafts while given the opportunity to grow creativity.” This is the spirit that pervades their spring 2008 production Pink Banana One Acts: The Next Big Thing.”

Robb Smith plays an American college professor working overseas in Beirut who is captured by terrorists. Forced to take in the world around him through sound alone, the professor spends much of his time trying analyzing the social complexity of his situation. Smith has a firm grasp on the character’s intellectual side, rendering an intelligent performance that is solidly rooted in emotional reality.

Tom Griffin’s comic drama The Boys Next Door brilliantly showcases a poignant, humorous story about people with developmental disabilities. The play deftly walks the line between complexity and accessibility by treating the characters as three-dimensional human beings instead of resorting to juvenile . . .

Pain and suffering, when they transcend the vague forms of conjecture and materialize into a cold, hard fact, can shake the firmest of faiths. When Michael Chobanoff, who plays C. S. Lewis in Acacia Theatre’s production of Shadowlands, stands before the audience and declares self-sufficiency is the enemy of salvation, even those unfamiliar with his life will have an inkling his complacency will be severely tested. And so it is.