“Black Watch” has been taking audiences by storm ever since its 2006 debut at Scotland’s Edinburgh Festival. Based on interviews with Scottish soldiers returning from the war in Iraq, the National Theatre of Scotland’s high-octane multimedia production combines movement, music, video and dialogue to create an urgent, often harrowing theater piece told from the soldiers’ point of view. Read More

For a woman who’s just written a book about the human digestive system, Mary Roach is surprisingly cheerful. The acclaimed Bay Area science writer seems perfectly happy to wade into subjects that would make most of us say “ick.” In her new book, “Gulp: Adventures Along the Alimentary Canal,” Roach delves deeply into how we eat — and what happens after. Informative and often hilariously funny, the book combines history, weird facts and up-to-the-minute interviews with physicians, researchers and other experts about events no one discusses in polite company. Read More

Bird-watching isn’t the only tie that binds the six women of “Our Practical Heaven,” now in its world premiere at Aurora Theatre. Sibling rivalry, aging and loss also fuel Anthony Clarvoe’s gentle multigenerational drama. And then there’s the family’s crumbling seaside home, which may soon be swallowed by the rising tides of climate change. Clarvoe, whose “Pick Up Ax” was a Bay Area hit, combines family themes with environmental concerns in this play, the third new work premiered in Aurora’s Global Age Project. Read More

Bradley Boatwright is in big trouble. The title character of “Troublemaker” has more on his mind than any 12-year-old kid in working-class Rhode Island should have to face. In Dan LeFranc’s rollicking comedy, now making its world premiere at Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Bradley doesn’t really make trouble. He just attracts it. He’s being bullied by the town rich kid, Jake Miller (a sneering Robbie Tann). Adding insult to injury, Jake’s dad (Thomas Jay Ryan) is courting Bradley’s single mom (Jennifer Regan) — and recommending that Bradley be shipped off to reform school. Read More

The legend of “The White Snake” lives. The ancient Chinese fable about a serpent who assumes a woman’s shape gets a mesmerizing theatrical update in the new Berkeley Repertory Theatre production written and directed by Mary Zimmerman. In her seventh show for the company, Zimmerman emphasizes the magical, shape-shifting qualities of this timeless story of enduring love. Read More

The tragedy of “Elektra” echoes through the American Conservatory Theater this month, as Sophocles’ bloody tale of vengeance in the aftermath of the Trojan War once again casts its mesmerizing spell. This is Greek tragedy with a difference. Presented in a newly commissioned translation by British playwright Timberlake Wertenbaker, acted by a vibrant ensemble cast and running a taut 90 minutes (without intermission), the production speaks to contemporary audiences while retaining the play’s timeless appeal. Read More

The stage doesn’t fill with a cast of thousands. “An Iliad,” the mesmerizing theater piece that opened Wednesday at Berkeley Repertory Theatre, manages to create the sights and sounds, the epic sweep and tragic immediacy of the Trojan War in the performance of a single actor. In this brisk, often harrowing 100-minute play by director Lisa Peterson and actor Denis O’Hare, based on Homer’s poem (translated by Robert Fagles), the clash is seen through the eyes of a battle-weary Poet (the great Henry Woronicz) charged with telling an oft-told tale. Read More