Boston Theater This Weekend: What’s Dazzling, Closing, and Opening

I was at BAA recording on Thursday (a conversation with The Getaway Driver playwright Deborah Salem Smith) and ended up in the elevator with a dance teacher at the school. I found that I had to recommend Operation Mincemeat to him, shouting it awkwardly after him as he dashed off to a meeting. It's not a show that you might think of for dance. But it is an exceptionally choreographed show that is equal parts funny and moving, but overwhelmingly, more than anything else, dazzling.

Five actors play more than 80 roles, switching costumes and physical presence sometimes onstage and mid-song. It is magical stagecraft, elevated by the wonderfully expressive performances of the cast.

I booked through BosTix several weeks ago, and my obstructed view seat was, well, obstructed. But it only diminished my enjoyment by a fraction. Lisa scored a Lucky Seat ticket in the orchestra section.

If you’re making theater plans this weekend, a few shows are wrapping up: Covenant closes Saturday, Oct. 17, at SpeakEasy Stage’s Roberts Studio Theatre at the BCA, and Harvard Hyperion’s Othello at Agassiz Theatre closes Sunday, Oct. 18.

Shows come through ArtsEmerson so fast—blink and you’ll miss them, which is what’s happening to me this weekend. Taylor Mac and Matt Ray: Songs from Bark of Millions opened Thursday at the Emerson Paramount Center and closes Sunday, Oct. 18. Five performances! That’s it! It looks fantastic, and I’m so sad that my week shifted around and I won’t be able to make it. If you go, please tell me about it so I can be appropriately jealous.

I will be at To Kill a Mockingbird at the Huntington this weekend, a show that's been on my calendar since the Huntington announced their season. This is the first regional production of Aaron Sorkin’s adaptation, directed by Loretta Greco, taking a fresh look at a familiar story and what its questions about justice, empathy, and taking a stand ask of us.

Over in Jamaica Plain, Someone Will Remember Us opens tonight at the Footlight Club and runs through Oct. 24 at Eliot Hall. An original play by Jenna Schlags, it’s part of the company’s 7A Black Box series. If you haven't been to the Footlight Club it's worth knowing that this is the oldest continuously operating community theater in the country, now in its 150th season!

Also onstage: Wicked at the Citizens Opera House; All My Sons at Lyric Stage (through Oct. 25, so you have this weekend and next); Actors’ Shakespeare Project’s Dracula: A Comedy of Terrors at the Mosesian Center for the Arts in Watertown; and Bat Boy: The Musical and the recently opened I and You, both at the Umbrella Arts Center in Concord.

If All My Sons is on your list, I wrote earlier this fall about seeing it alongside Purpose and the questions both left rattling around in my head—about family secrets, what we inherit, and what it actually means to protect the people we love. (Purpose has closed, but you still have this weekend and next to catch All My Sons.)

If you're leaning into the spooky, with Covenant, Dracula, Bat Boy, etc., be sure to listen to Scene in Boston's conversation with directors Dawn M. Simmons (Covenant) and Jeremy Johnson (Bat Boy) about what lurks in the shadows, who gets called a monster, and why these stories give us more to think about than what goes bump in the night.

You can find the episode on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Finally, a little Scene in Boston news: we have a store! There are T-shirts, stickers, and things for the smaller theater lovers in your life. You can also pick up our 2026–27 season guide if you’d like some help figuring out what to see beyond this weekend. Every purchase helps support Scene in Boston and the work we do with our student production team at BAA. Take a look around—and if you spot me wearing Scene in Boston merch everywhere, well, this is what happens when you make yourself a store.

See you at the theater!