By Robert Simonson
05 Sep 2010

	Bottom of the World director Caitriona McLaughlin and playwright Lucy Thurber
	photo by Ari Mintz

On Oct. 28, MCC Theatre returns to the playwright with which it is most associated: Neil LaBute. Their last collaboration, Reasons to Be Pretty, went to Broadway. The Break of Noon, the new play, was supposed to have premiered back in early 2009 but was cancelled. Jo Bonney directs the tale of a man who sees the face of God during the chaos and horror of an office shooting, beginning Oct. 28 at the Lucille Lortel.

The Altantic Theater Company had some luck with a double bill of Harold Pinter when it presented Celebation and The Room in 2005. This Nov. 3, it tries its hand as another pair of short works by the playwright, The Collection and A Kind of Alaska. It will precede that with Bottom of the World, a new play by Lucy Thurber about a woman who delves into the world of her sister's final novel, starting Sept. 3. (While ATC's mainstage is being expanded and renovated, productions will play at borrowed spaces.)

Words are also part of the characters' world in The Language Archive, a new Julia Cho play that begins at the Roundabout Theatre Company's Laura Pels Theatre Sept. 24. In the drama, a man consumed with preserving and documenting the dying languages of far-flung cultures doesn't know what to say to his wife to keep her from leaving him, and doesn't recognize the deep feelings that his lab assistant has for him.

Finally, Jan Maxwell, a two-time Tony Award nominee this past season, gets one of her best roles to date in Second Stage's revival of Arthur Kopit's 1978 play Wings. She will play the central character of Emily Stilson, a female stoke victim, in this production directed by John Doyle. It commences Oct. 5

	The Keen Company dedicates its season to Michael Frayn
	photo by Aubrey Reuben

Also of interest: Tigers Be Still, Kimberly Rosenstock's new play about a woman who finds herself unemployed, overwhelmed and back at home after earning her masters degree in art therapy, at the Roundabout Theatre Company's Black Box Theatre Sept. 10; underneathmybed, Florencia Lozano's play about ghosts of a foreign dirty war who invade the Jimenez family home, while a woman remembers the moment in her life when she disappeared for good, at Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, opening Sept. 10; Through the Night, Daniel Beaty's solo play about six African-American males, ages 10-60, who discover the power of possibility through one extraordinary event, at the Union Square Theatre from Sept. 10; In Transit, an a cappella musical about a group of people on a subway, at Primary Stages, starting Sept. 21; Spirit Control, Beau Willimon's story of an air traffic controller who must guide the passenger of a small plane through an emergency landing, at Manhattan Theatre Club, beginning Oct. 7; There Are No More Big Secrets, actress Heidi Schreck's new play about an American expat who returns to the United Stages with his Russian journalist wife and their daughter, and seeks refuge for his family in the home of his old friends, at Rattlestick from Nov. 3; Mistakes Were Made, Craig Wright's comedy about a Broadway producer who gets in way over his head when he takes on the first world-premiere of his career, at Barrow Street Theatre beginning Nov. 5; After the Revolution, Playwrights Horizons' presentation of Amy Herzog's play about a shocking truth that forces a Marxist family to confront questions of honesty and allegiance, commencing Oct. 21; The New Group's Blood From a Stone, Tommy Nohilly's play about a troubled working-class family in New Britain, CT (dates TBA); A Small Fire, the latest from playwright Adam Bock, running at Playwrights Horizons from Dec. 10; TACT/The Actors Company Theatre's presentation of Vaclav Havel's The Memorandum, from Oct. 25; and the U.S. premiere of Alphabetical Order, which will run from Sept. 14, and is part of the Keen Company's season dedicated to Michael Frayn.