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Al Stilo, director of sales & marketing for Lawrenceville’s Aurora Theatre (and a reliably entertaining actor in his own right) sent me an e-mail about Aurora’s season finale, Michael Frayn’s Noises Off, which the theater has extended through June 1. Al acknowledged that I tend to favor edgy theatrical fare, but said:

“Edginess is relative however, and I hope that I can tempt you to attend Noises Off by letting you know you will be attending the first production in Aurora Theatre history to feature the f-word. Doesn’t that seem worth the drive?”

Aurora is billing Noises Off as “the greatest farce ever written,” and while that’s a bold statement that encompasses centuries of theater history, I have trouble thinking of a farce that’s better constructed or more ingenious. Famed critic Frank Rich called and said that it “is, was, and probably always will be the funniest play written in my lifetime.” Aurora’s cast includes Megan Hayes (pictured), Robert Egizio and Jeff McKerley, and the combination certainly sounds worth the drive.

Although Frayn is probably best known for Noises Off, two of my favorite Frayn works are a little more scholarly. His cerebral historical drama Copenhagen dramatizes a 1941 meeting with Danish physicist Niels Bohr and his German protege, Werner Heisenberg, and concerns Nazis, atom-smashing and the morality of science in war-time. One of my favorite recent novels is Headlong, Frayn’s hilarious account of a blocked writer who grows obsessed with the possibility that his neighbor unwittingly owns an undiscovered Brueghel painting worth a fortune. It’s the kind of thoughtful and funny book I feel confident recommending to practically anyone.

(Photo courtesy of Aurora Theatre)

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(Photo by Greg Mooney)

Susan V. Booth, artistic director of the Tony-winning Alliance Theatre, ventures well outside the perimeter to direct Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie for Lawrenceville’s Aurora Theatre from March 5-April 5, 2009. It’s a coup for Aurora and the highlight of its newly announced 2008-09 theatrical season.

Aurora’s schedule also features vampires, corpses and the devil (which makes it sound more like a season of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”). The season begins with the musical Damn Yankees (“in celebration of the Gwinnett Braves bringing us professional baseball”), in which a baseball fan sells his soul to the devil to play a winning season with his favorite team (Aug. 7-Sep. 7). Next, something wicked this way comes with Steven Dietz’s adaptation of Dracula in time for Halloween (Oct. 7-Nov. 2). After the perennial Christmas Canteen (Nov. 28-Dec. 21), Aurora presents the vintage English mystery Corpse!, featuring one actor playing identical twins (Jan. 15-Feb. 8).

Following The Glass Menagerie next spring, Aurora’s season finishes up with the Caribbean fairy-tale musical Once On This Island from the creators of Ragtime and Seussical. Overall it sounds like a commercially savvy line-up, but it’s a shame that it includes no show as new or intriguing as Aurora’s brainy, risky comedy Bach at Leipzig from last fall.

Incidentally, Booth directs the Alliance Theatre’s next main stage show, the Pulitzter-winning drama Doubt, which begins previews April 2.

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