16 theater productions to see this fall

Storytelling can always be counted on as a source of entertainment, inspiration and reflection. This season, local theaters have assembled a variety of offerings that center family, love and identity, such as the world premiere of playwright Mfoniso Udofia’s “The Ceremony” or stagings of the musicals “Fun Home” and “Wonder.” Other productions remind us of the importance of pioneers and activists, like in “The Kitty Knox Plays” and “The Mountaintop.” Whether theatergoers crave serious dramas or are in search of magic and whimsy, there’s something to satisfy those urges this fall. Here are 16 productions to consider.

In the sixth installment of playwright Mfoniso Udofia’s Ufot Family Cycle, Ekong, the son of Abasiama and Disciple, has fallen in love with a Nepali woman named Lumanthi. The union, however, isn’t what either of the couple’s parents had in mind. Will the couple’s parents have a change of heart and get behind the union? Or, will they be left to say “I do” without their loved ones? Audience members will find out in this world premiere, directed by Kevin R. Free. The Ufot Family Cycle comprises nine narratives that are being produced over two years across Greater Boston, an initiative spearheaded by The Huntington in partnership with numerous theaters and community organizations.

In David Templeton’s “Featherbaby,” a foul-mouthed parrot has a lot to say about everything. Paul Melendy, who was excellent in Gloucester Stage Company’s “Garbologists,” stars as the sassy pet bird caught in the middle of a deteriorating relationship between his owner, Angie, and her boyfriend, Mason. The show is full of food fights and profanity and explores themes of love and ownership. Weylan Simes directs this world premiere.

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In 1893, Kittie Knox, a mixed-race seamstress and bicyclist from Cambridge, was a founding member of the Riverside Cycling Club, the first black cycling group in the United States. During her seven-year cycling career, the pioneering Knox completed 100-mile rides, challenged the League of American Wheelmen’s color bar as a member (a rare feat due to the exclusion of Black members by many chapters), and resisted conforming to rigid gender norms around fashion and speed. Her life as a cyclist and activist is at the center of “The Kittie Knox Plays,” a theatrical trilogy written by Kirsten Greenidge (“Milk Like Sugar,” “Luck of the Irish”), Claire Gardner and Patrick Gabridge, producing artistic director of Plays in Place, with the help of historical consultant Lorenz Finison. The one-act plays will be directed by Michele Aguillon and staged outdoors on Saturdays at Cambridge Crossing, the Eustis Estate Museum in Milton, and Christian Herter Park in Boston.

It’s a particularly prescient time to stage “The Mountaintop,” a play by Katori Hall that reimagines the great orator and civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.’s last evening before his assassination. The action in the narrative takes place in Dr. King’s Memphis hotel room after he delivers one of his most popular speeches on April 3, 1968, where he declared, “Trouble is in the land. Confusion all around,” and told the crowd that he had seen the promised land. After the speech, he heads to the Lorraine Motel to relax until someone arrives with unexpected news, which prompts him to consider his life and legacy. Maurice Emmanuel Parent, producing artistic director and co-founder of Front Porch Arts Collective, will direct. Parent starred as King in a 2013 production, at a time when headlines about a post-racial America were in the news due to the election of the nation’s first Black president, Barack Obama.

Death and comedy don’t seem likely bedfellows, but in “Sardines,” written and performed by Chris Grace, the looming end of one’s life is balanced with humor, according to the event’s description. The one-person show, which had a run at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, aims to investigate tough questions about enjoying life despite its expiration date. Last year, Grace told the Phoenix Remix that the show “is a solo comedy about all the people that have died in my life, and whether or not making a comedy about that subject can help you feel better about it.”

Creative expression can be a restorative balm during tough times. That seems to be the case for Australian comedian Sam Kissajukian. Four years ago, the comedian spent six months off the stage and inside the walls of an abandoned cake factory. While there, he created 300 large paintings, unknowingly documenting a long manic episode. Since his recovery, diagnosis and subsequent treatment, Kissajukian has had solo art exhibitions of his work and adds a mix of  “spoken word and comedic examination of his visual art and practice, paired with a curated exhibition,” according to his website. In “300 Paintings,” Kissajukian explores the intersection of art, mental health and creativity.

Leonardo is a monster who isn’t good at scaring people, until he meets a kid named Sam, who is afraid of just about everything. But Leonardo wonders if meeting Sam is his chance to make a new friend or finally scare the socks off someone. “Leonardo! A Wonderful Story About a Terrible Monster” is the stage adaptation of Mo Willems’ 2005 children’s picture book “Leonardo the Terrible Monster.” The play uses book pages, illustrated paper, furry monster puppets and song to bring the story to life. The show was originally commissioned by Manual Cinema as a virtual broadcast. The event description notes that showgoers can watch the “big screen like a traditional movie, or watch the artists below as they create the story in real time.” Manual Cinema is an Emmy Award-winning performance collective, design studio and production company founded in 2010. The group’s work weaves together handmade shadow puppetry, cinematic techniques, sound and music to create immersive stories for stage and screen.

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In “Hang Time,” three Black men chit-chat beneath an old wide tree. Written by Pulitzer Prize finalist Zora Howard, the play centers Blood, who is young and restless, Slim, a middle-aged fraudster type, and Bird, the oldest of the trio, and explores all the good and bad that has occurred in each of their lives. They talk of the blues, personal ideologies, the world and their fears. However, in Howard’s subversive work, the conversation isn’t what it seems. The play stars Kamal Bolden, Julian Rozzell and Bryce Foley.

This new musical, with music and lyrics by Justin Huertas, follows homebody Trevor, who happens to have green scales for skin. One night, Trevor goes on his first date in a year with someone he met on a dating app. But the date is anything but ordinary. During the outing, Trevor learns he has superpowers, finds out about a pending dragon apocalypse, and must do his part to stop it. Directed by Lyndsay Allyn Cox, this coming-of-age tale with an indie rock score is about acceptance, community and “becoming the hero in your own life.”

When a young girl flees into a dark forest to escape war, she ends up in another kind of battle. In the forest, she is rescued by a witch who teaches her the craft. But as her skills grow, it fans the flames of her rage and hatred toward Macbeth, the person who murdered her parents. She embarks on a vengeful journey to make Macbeth pay, but what will it cost to win this battle? This is the second opportunity to view Manual Cinema’s work this season. (See above: “Leonardo! A Wonderful Story About a Terrible Monster.”) “The 4th Witch” is inspired by components of Shakespeare’s “Macbeth.” This is the work’s regional premiere.

Playwright Ins Choi has called his play, “Kim’s Convenience,” a “love letter to his parents and to all first-generation immigrants who call Canada their home,” according to the show’s description. The story is about a Korean man named Mr. Kim who immigrates to Toronto and opens a convenience store to support his family. As time goes on, Mr. Kim takes stock of a changing neighborhood and his children, who are quickly adopting some ideals that vary from his own. The play inspired the Netflix series of the same name, which premiered in July 2018. Choi will star as Mr. Kim in this production of “Kim’s Convenience.”

In “Summer, 1976” by David Auburn, two very different women form a transformative friendship through a babysitting co-op. Alice is a housewife and Diana is a very independent artist. In this memory play told through alternating monologues, the two women confide in one another and lean on this friendship that changes the direction of their lives. Paula Plum will make her Central Square Theater directorial debut with this production.

In “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child,” Harry’s son Albus forms a friendship with Scorpius Malfoy, the son of his nemesis Draco Malfoy. The two young friends travel back in time to the Twizard Tournament to save Cedric Diggory’s life, but their choices create alternative timelines. In the play, the characters embark on a wild adventure full of magic, battles and more. Will Cedric be saved? What will come from the alternative timelines? And how can Albus and Scorpius fix what they’ve changed? Wizard-loving showgoers will have the chance to find out in this six-time Tony Award-winning play written by Jack Thorne, from an original story by Thorne, J. K. Rowling and John Tiffany.

Cartoonist Alison Bechdel’s 2006 graphic memoir “Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic” chronicles her life growing up in Pennsylvania and her strained relationship with her closeted father. The book — which spent two weeks on the “New York Times Best Seller List” — was adapted for the stage by Lisa Kron and set to music by Jeanine Tesori, and made it’s off-Broadway debut in 2013. The following year, the musical was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and has since won five Tony Awards. The Huntington’s production will be directed by Logan Ellis.

In Cirque du Soleil’s “Twas the Night Before,” a young girl named Isabella isn’t really feeling Christmas like she used to. She has grown weary of her family’s holiday tradition. Typically, she and her dad would get lost in the wonder of reading “A Visit from Saint Nicholas” (commonly referred to as “Twas the Night Before Christmas”), a poem by Clement Clarke Moore. Somehow, she travels into the world of the poem where she meets acrobats, characters and reindeer who help restore the spirit of Christmas for her and her father.

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Auggie Pullman, a child with a facial difference, learns to navigate the world without the helmet he’s used to hide his face in the musical “Wonder.” with a book by MacArthur Fellow and Pulitzer Prize finalist Sarah Ruhl and a score by the Grammy Award-winning duo Ian Axel and Chad King. For his entire life, Auggie was homeschooled, but one day, his family decides that it’s time for him to go to school. The experience pushes him to search for and find belonging, and for the rest of the family to start centering themselves instead of only worrying about Auggie’s needs. The show is based on the novel by R.J. Palacio and the Lionsgate and Mandeville film of the same name. Taibi Magar directs the world-premiere adaptation.