Brianna Borger and Wayne Hu/Photo: Johnny Knight

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You have to hand it to L. Walter Stearns, who is ending his twelve-year stint as artistic director of Porchlight Music Theatre: he is going out with a bang, to be sure, directing what may be his best-ever production as the company takes on its first-ever Rodgers and Hammerstein musical.

Introducing the show from the stage each night as has been his trademark, Stearns’ contagious enthusiasm manifested itself as usual on opening night, though along the way in thanking various folks “from the bottom of my heart” for making his years at the helm of Porchlight “so joyous,” the emotion spilled over into tears. It is that same deep sensitivity that has guided careful attention to details in Stearns’ shows—often on a shoestring budget—and which is very much in evidence in his careful direction of “The King and I.”

Richard Rodgers’ daughter Mary, a composer herself, always considered “The King and I” to be the best collaboration between her father and Oscar Hammerstein II and indeed, when all of the elements are so rightfully in place as they are here and immensely enhanced by an intimate setting, it would be hard to argue the point. Read the rest of this entry »

Angelica Acebedo, Irene Patiño

When crossing the desert with little but your boots separating you from the merciless elements, companionship and determination are the only things that will help you survive. And for every immigrant crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, there’s yet another, more human and therefore more cruel risk: that you might be abandoned by your fellow travelers, or found by border-patrol officers who will send you back. Kara Hartzler’s play based on interviews with real immigrants takes root in the portrayal of four women in just such circumstances.

For the most part “Roosters” manages to balance the politics with the threat of real, physical danger, yet ultimately the tone of the play, at times funny and at times deadly serious, is disjointed. The production, directed by Tanya Saracho, is an intimate and sympathetic one. Imaginative shadow puppets aid the telling of folk tales, and though beautiful the puppets often feel unnecessary. Like the story of the girl who sheds her skin to fly, the play works best when Saracho lets her ladies’ bones soar. (Neal Ryan Shaw)

Prop Thtr, 3502 North Elston, (773)539-7838. Through May 29.

Photo: Anthony LaPenna

Theater companies that promise to deliver on both the immediacy of live theater and the accessibility and gloss of multimedia often run into the problem of incongruous blends of traditionally constructed scripts with bits of video shoehorned in. Not so with InFusion’s current production, not the least because “Soul Samurai” scribe Qui Nguyen’s own New York-based company, Vampire Cowboys, has a similar bent toward electronically infused live entertainment.

This tale of a girl samurai navigating a post-apocalyptic future Brooklyn overrun by warring gangs and plagued by a nonfunctioning mass-transit system feels, looks and sounds like a video game, comic book, exploitation film and Tarantino ripoff all rolled into one. The relentlessness of the show can grow laborious, simply because the highs are really high and the lows really low. Christine Lin as the girl samurai Dewdrop and the rest of the cast barrel through the show breathlessly and with abandon, inviting geeks of all stripes to ride the sugar high along with them. Yet afterward, all you’ve really got to show for it is a tummy ache. (Neal Ryan Shaw)

InFusion Theatre Company at Theater Wit, 1229 West Belmont, (773)975-8150. Through June 5.