1. The Fortress of Solitude, Wyly Theatre, starts previews Mar. 7.
Named for Superman’s secret Artic headquarters, Jonathan Lethem’s semi-autographical novel-turned-musical concerns two boyhood friends who grow up together in Brooklyn’s newly-christened Boerum Hill in the 1970s. The narrative follows the boys as their lives diverge on different paths. The Fortress of Solitude, with a book by Itamar Moses (The Four of Us, Completeness) and music and lyrics by Michael Friedman (Bloody, Bloody Andrew Jackson), marks the Dallas Theater Center’s continued collaboration with the The Public Theater in New York. The musical will have an off-Broadway run after the Dallas premiere. You don’t want to miss this one.
2. We Will Rock You, Music Hall at Fair Park, through Mar. 16.
It’s safe to say that a vintage Queen concert, commanded by the late, theatrical Freddie Mercury, had plenty of drama. But the Queen musical functions not just as a vehicle for the band’s multitude of hits but also as a cautionary tale of a homogenized society where music comes out of a computer and instruments are outlawed. When aspiring rockers band together for a Bohemian resistance, a man named Galileo emerges to lead the rebellion.
3. Out of the Loop Fringe Festival, Addison Theatre Centre, Mar. 6-16.
Technically, not just one show. It’s almost two solid weeks of art, music, and theater, part of the WaterTower Theatre’s long-running festival devoted to producing edgy, contemporary work.
4. Less Than Kind, Theatre Three, Mar. 6-Mar. 30.
Theatre Three imports this sharp British comedy, written by Terence Rattigan, for its American premiere. Set in London in 1944, a teenage son flirting with socialism returns home to find that his widowed mother has taken up with a married senior minister who is paying more attention to his affair than the storming of Normandy.
5. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Winspear Opera House/Hamon Hall, Mar. 9 & 10.
This is a staged reading of Willie Shakespeare’s popular love quadrangle. Should you ever find yourself enmeshed in a love quadrangle yourself, be grateful that you’re not also at the mercy of a bunch of meddling fairies.
