Mark Cofta’s April theater picks

This month's theater should keep audiences hopping through April, with a rich variety of exciting offerings from Shakespeare to The Stinky Cheese Man.

Doctor Faustus — judging from Quintessence Theatre Group's Saint Joan — should be a thrilling show. Christopher Marlowe's supernatural drama (March 30 through April 24) runs in repertory with George Bernard Shaw's witty, fresh play about Joan of Arc with the same great cast and director Alexander Burns's ramp-like stage, which slices through the audience.

The Philadelphia Shakespeare Theatre features repertory too: tragic Macbeth (April 1 - May 21) and comedic Twelfth Night (April 14 - May 22), also using one acting company, both directed by Carmen Khan.

The circus, monsters, and murder

The Philadelphia Artists' Collective collaborates with the Philadelphia School of Circus Arts for Walter Wykes' adaptation of Leonid Andreyev's He Who Gets Slapped (March 30 - April 16), set in a French circus joined by a mysterious new clown.

Fringe favorites New Paradise Laboratories premiere O Monsters (April 22 - 30) at FringeArts, exploring horror through monsters who don't know they are monstrous. Whit MacLaughlin directs a fine cast: Kate Czajkowski, Emilie Krause, Kevin Meehan, and Matteo Scammell.

EgoPo concludes their American Giants II: The Women season with Sophie Treadwell's seldom-seen 1928 Expressionist classic Machinal (April 20 - May 8), inspired by a real murder case and directed by the always-provocative Brenna Geffers.

History and new fairy tales

The Media Theatre revives the silly and sublime 1969 musical 1776 (April 13 - May 22), Sherman Edwards and Peter Stone's underappreciated (perhaps because it requires so many men, all in period costumes) story of the writing of the Declaration of Independence. Ben Dibble stars.

Children's theater often gets pushed to the side. I've lobbied unsuccessfully for a Barrymore Award specifically for children's productions, which would finally highlight the many fine area professional productions for kids. The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales (April 6 - June 12), adapted by John Glore from the book written by Jon Scieszka and illustrated by Lane Smith, messes creatively with the fairy tale classics we all know. Matthew Decker, last year's Barrymore-winning director for a more "adult" fairy tale mash-up, Into the Woods at Theatre Horizon, directs Stinky Cheese Man at the Arden.

From the virtual world to the rodeo

Jennifer Haley's science fiction thriller The Nether (May 25 - April 17) creates a dystopian future in which a young detective investigates cyber-ethical crimes in the virtual universe. Seth Rozin directs InterAct's production. (Here's my BSR review.)

Philadelphia Theatre Company (in a co-production with the George Street Playhouse of New Brunswick, NJ) presents Sex with Strangers (April 8 - May 8), Laura Eason's acclaimed comedy about two writers trapped together in a bed & breakfast by a snowstorm.

Quince Productions, which produces an amazing array of gay-themed theater, dance, cabaret, and comedy each August in GayFest!, presents the local premiere of Philip Dawkins's comedy Rodeo (April 7 - 23), about a cowgirl and her mule entering a rodeo — but girls aren't allowed. Shenanigans ensue when they disguise themselves as boy and horse, respectively.

Don't forget college shows

Before the school year ends, catch the exciting work appearing on local college stages. Bryn Mawr College presents Shakespeare's King Lear (April 8 - 16), directed by Mark Lord, and sure to be a mind-bending adventure.

Villanova Theatre closes their season with Brian Friel's Translations (April 12 - 24), in which an English cartographer ventures to a small Irish town in 1833, where he falls in love with the local language and a local lass.

Temple University Theaters gives a fresh interpretation of crowd-pleaser Godspell (April 13 - 24), directed by Peter Reynolds and Amina Robinson.

The University of the Arts ends its school year with two projects: Apartment 27 (four Tennessee Williams one-acts) and Jenny Schwartz's God's Ear (April 21 - 30) in rep.