Toby Zinman   

Enda Walsh's The Walworth Farce is a perfect example of Marx's observation that "history repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce." Inis Nua Theatre Company presents this very Irish, very theatrical play about families and violence and the endless acting out of the past at Off-Broad Street Theatre. Tom Reing directs and J. Alex Cordaro choreographs the fights, of which there are many.

The Irish Heritage Theatre, a new company, is introducing itself to the city with Brian Friel’s Philadelphia, Here I Come!

Theatre Exile's dazzling production of A Behanding in Spokane is both hilarious and creepy - that signature Martin McDonagh combo. An evenly excellent cast, directed by Joe Canuso, convinced me that a play I thought was merely a star turn (Christopher Walken being that star when I saw it on Broadway in 2010) is stand-alone terrific.

I had been dutifully watching the trailer for Philadelphia Shakespeare Theatre's new production of Titus Andronicus, listening to Aaron Cromie, who directs it, burble on, talking-head style, about going to graduate school, blah blah blah. And then his head started to bleed. And the blood gushed down his face, and still he talked. This, I said to myself, is going to be a Titus Andronicus to remember. And so it is.

Flashpoint The­atre Company is giving Jacqueline Gold­fin­ger’s new play, Slip/Shot, a fine pre­miere. This beau­ti­ful­ly crafted and in­tense­ly moving dra­ma about the leg­a­cy of rac­ist fear is served by a pow­er­ful cast and an imag­i­na­tive and skilled di­rec­tor, Reb­ecca Wright. The plot is un­com­pli­cat­ed, but the characters are not. Clem (Kevin Mee­han) is a new po­lice­man in a small town near Tal­la­has­see, Fla., some­time in the ear­ly 1960s. He is haunted by his no-good, rac­ist fa­ther and has turned his back on him. Clem’s wife, Kit­ty (Ra­chel Camp), is blonde and sexy, so it doesn’t seem to mat­ter much that her cooking does not ex­tend be­yond pea­nut but­ter and jel­ly sandwiches.

You may be shaken but certainly not stirred at the Bearded Ladies’ newest show, Beards Are for Shaving: A 007 Cabaret. This ... group? company? collective? team? of terrifically clever performers takes on the iconic with great voices and irreverent glee: Last time it was Scarlett O’Hara, next time it will be Marie Antoinette (just in time for Bastille Day). This time it’s James Bond. Where better to interrogate gender roles than with bearded ladies and the world’s infatuation with the man “who took the hu out of humanity.” There is faux bondage, there are cardboard guns and cardboard sharks, and a laser that looks like a middle-school science-fair project. Into these hallowed scenes of bad guys and sexy women, with songs like “Live and Let Die,” “Thunderball,” and “Diamonds Are Forever,” comes feminist scholar Judith Baxter (author of the book Gender Trouble) in a black S&M costume who tries to emasculate James Bond, a “relic of the Cold War,” and thereby free us all from gender nostalgia. “Tomorrow is coming, Mr. Bond, and tomorrow never dies.”

Before there was Stonewall, before there was ACT UP, there was the Mattachine Society, the first gay-rights organization in the United States. Mauckingbird Theatre Company, dedicated to gay-themed theater, is presenting The Temperamentals by Jon Marans, about the founding of the society. This is a history play, meant to inform and inspire. Which it does, sort of.

Azuka Theatre's production of Hope Street and Other Lonely Places by Genne Murphy is exactly the kind of show I want to like. A small theater company, a new script by a local playwright, and under the direction of Kevin Glaccum, who runs the company. I arrived with my cheerleader pom-poms at the ready.

No wonder the title has an exclamation point! Loud and colorful and wildly energetic, the bio-musical Fela!, about the Nigerian revolutionary and musician, has electrified audiences all over the world.

Sam Shepard, the self-proclaimed "rock-and-roll Jesus with a cowboy mouth," rides again at the Wilma Theater, where Curse of the Starving Class is having a strong revival.