Contestants enviously welcome last year’s Miss Glamouresse on stage, moments before finding out whether they’ll be crowned as the new winner. 

If you are looking for a hilarious and suspenseful way to spend your night, then buy yourself a ticket to Pageant at Island City Stage. As described on their website, this show can most definitely be described as “A Miss America Competition Meets RuPaul’s Drag Race!” Not only will this show have you invested in every character and secretly wishing for your favorite to win, but it will also have you gasping for air from all the laughing you’ll be doing.

Pigs Do Fly Productions, which was established with the specific goal of telling stories featuring characters over 50 “living their lives in interesting, involved and exciting ways,” embodies that mission 110 percent with their current production of The Savannah Sipping Society, staged at Wilton Manors venue Empire Stage. This charming and straightforward southern-themed comedy is centered around not one such interesting older character but a full foursome of them, all of who are brought to life by an equally vibrant coalition of mature South Florida actresses who are giving their all to respective roles. 

Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle states that it is impossible to measure or calculate exactly, both the position and the momentum of an object. What this basically means, is that we can never know where someone is in their life, where they’re going, and where they want to go. 

Simon Stephens took this idea and wrapped it in an unconventional love story. The season opener for GableStage is an intimate two-hander, exploring the start and development of a friendship as it evolves and changes these two characters’ lives. 

Written by Marvin Glassman

Despite the fact that the Elian Gonzalez saga has been entrenched in American history more than 22 years ago, the 1999 story of a six year old motherless Cuban boy rescued in South Florida by a fisherman still provokes critical observations about the political battle between paternal rights of a father in communist Cuba and the rights of the young Cuban boy to grow up in a democratic country.

Miami New Drama at the Colony Theater in Miami Beach is revisiting the historical facts of the saga in Elian by Cuban-American playwright Rogelio Martinez, running now through November 20.

From lyricist Mark Eaton, one of the team behind the long-running political satirical musical comedy revue Capitol Steps, comes DC’s Reflecting Fools, a similarly themed song–and-dance focusing on the madness of our current political landscape. This touring production can be caught at the Kravis Center For The Performing Arts until this November 6th, making it a timely pick ahead of midterm elections (and by the way, this is your reminder to go vote ASAP if you haven’t turned in your ballot!)

Jersey Boys, the jukebox musical that opens the 2022-23 season at the elegantly renovated Maltz Theatre in Jupiter, dramatizes the formation, success and eventual break-up of the 1960s rock ‘n’ roll group, The Four Seasons, an ensemble that time, money woes and misfortune have not expunged.

Check YouTube. You can find a video of lead singer Frankie Valli performing earlier this year at the Mohegan Sun Casino in Connecticut.

But Jersey Boys is a lot more than a simple story. It’s a paean to some kids who concocted a musical style while singing on street corners in New Jersey, then bucked it up by adding a youngster with a four-octave vocal range to create “the sound” that would go on to change a generation.

Thinking Cap Theatre is back in action at the eclectic Mad Arts Gallery with an equally eclectic exploration of The Importance Of Being Oscar. This play was written and first performed by Irish actor Micheál Mac Liammóir as a one-man show in 1960, with the title being an allusion to one of the best-known works of literary icon Oscar Wilde.

Here, though, the piece has been reimagined by the directorial vision of Nicole Stodard to become a three-actor endeavor. While it’s up to them all to help channel Oscar’s spirit, it’s Ronnie Larsen who’s mostly tasked with portraying the man himself, as well as a few other key figures. He is joined onstage by Bree-Anna Obst and Travon Pierre, each of who play multitudes of characters from Wilde’s life as well as those that appear in reenactments of his work. 

Palm Beach Dramaworks’ season has started up with a production of 4,000 Miles, a play by Amy Herzog that first premiered off-Broadway in 2011 and became a finalist for the 2013 Pulitzer Prize. And though the script itself may have its fair share of both bright moments and baffling pitfalls, this production has a notable advantage of having two incredible performances at its center. One of those is that of rising star Gabriell Salgado as Leo, a lost young man who has found himself washing up at the NYC apartment of his grandmother Vera, who is played by accomplished stage veteran Patricia Connolly, the other obvious standout. 

They may say that misery loves company; but, company or no, I can imagine it would be quite hard to come away from Empire Stage’s current production of Misery anything but satisfied. Based on the Stephen King classic, this spooky play is a perfect fit for the Halloween season, providing the requisite horror-style thrills but ultimately making a more lasting impact due to the chillingly believable nature of key antagonist Annie Wilkes.