Given the current state of our union, it’s not difficult to imagine that some people would seriously consider revolution. Local playwright Rex Winsome speculates on the lives of modern revolutionaries in his new, feature-length production, Paint the Town, a drama running July 11-27 at the Alchemist Theatre in Bay View.

For author Eugene O’Neill, Ah, Wilderness!, his only comedy, was clearly a catharsis of fancy. The Pulitzer and Nobel Prize-winning American playwright was best known for dramas doting on dysfunction and addiction based on personal experience. Scholars cite Wilderness, a warmly nostalgic snapshot of a New England family Fourth of July circa 1906, as the life O’Neill, born to an acting couple in a Broadway hotel room in 1888, probably wished he had.

Jesus Christ Superstar was a first at many levels when it debuted on stage in 1971. It began as a double album in 1970 with staging to follow a year later and coined the term “rock opera”; it brought worldwide attention to its young composers Andrew Lloyd Webber (music) and Tim Rice (lyrics) and it depicted the son of God as a human being full of doubts and uncertainty about His predestined fate. The Shorewood Players are finishing up their 78th season with a production of the opera that, despite some problematic choices, points out the strengths of the music and lyrics built around the last seven days in Christ’s mortal life.

Local sketch comedy group Broadminded launched its second show of the year this past weekend. Stacy Babl, Anne Graff LaDisa, Melissa Kingston and Megan McGee return in a show that mixes pre-recorded video segments with live performance. Broadminded: Now In 3-D! takes comedic aim at the mass media in more than a dozen different skits. The show’s comedy is a slightly uneven mix of quality, but even though there are moments when the “broads” fail to be funny, they never fail to be fun. Overall this is a very good show. There are only a couple of skits in the mix that are completely . . .

The Skylight Opera Theatre ends its season this afternoon with a final production of the feel-good musical The Spitfire Grill at 2 p.m. Based on a 1996 film, the story follows a woman recently released from prison who concocts a plan to save the small-town grill that took a chance on employing her.

The Sunset Playhouse’s latest production mines humor from one of the most unlikely, sensitive sources: people with developmental disabilities. Tom Griffin’s comic drama The Boys Next Door deftly walks the line people complexity and accessibility by treating its characters as three-dimensional human beings instead of . . .

The Skylight Opera Theatre ends its season with a production of the feel-good musical The Spitfire Grill, which continues its run tonight with a 7:30 p.m. performance at the Broadway Theatre Center. Based on a 1996 film, the story follows a woman recently released from prison who concocts a plan to save the small . . .

Deborah Clifton (a longtime member of the late, great Theatre X) and Peggy Hong (the poet) present a piece entitled Small Pieces Fly To Heaven this weekend only at the Off-Broadway Theatre. It’s a look at the five year-old Iraq war and its effect on both American and Iraqi women. The show uses poetry, movement . . .

In Tandem Theatre continues its Midwest premiere of The Girl in the Frame this afternoon at the Tenth Street Theatre with a 2 p.m. performance. The musical, directed by In Tandem co-founder Jane Flieller, closes the company’s first season in the new space. Simon Provan and Alison Mary Forbes play Alex and Laney . . .

Jokes about hot flashes and mood swings abound in the popular touring production of Menopause: The Musical, which beings its month-long run at the Marcus Center this week. Here, the women of a certain age deal with their emotional and hormonal fluctuations through song, delivering 25 comedic send-ups of songs . . .