Ensemble members in The Birds

What this says about the state of America I don’t know ... or maybe don’t want to know. But for the first time since I started attending Genesius Guild’s season-closing comedies more than a decade ago, director/adapter Don Wooten’s political jabs and jokes – here in service of Aristophanes’ The Birds – were less ridiculous, much less ridiculous, than current, real-world politics. I may have left Friday’s opening-night performance wishing it were more biting, but in retrospect, in this particular year, playing it safe may have been the smartest way to go.

Even if the only Chekhov you're familiar with is the crew member of the Starship Enterprise, you will likely still enjoy New Ground Theatre’s production of Uncle. Featuring characters created by Anton Chekhov, it's a clever look at the lives of people as they react to change, and before attending the April 29 production, I decided to study up on Chekhov (the writer) and Uncle Vanya, thinking I would need to be versed in this Russian play first performed in 1897. I consequently discovered it was unnecessary to have prepared to such an extent. One does not need to know anything about Chekhov or Uncle Vanya to be entertained by Tony-nominated playwright Lee Blessing's Uncle. Davenport's New Ground Theatre was chosen, by its author, for the comedy's world premiere, and the company capably delivered.

Michael Carron, Calvin Co, and Adam Cerny in TribesThe QC Theatre Workshop's Tribes didn't start off well for me on Friday, as I immediately hated Adam Cerny's overacting, with eye rolls so huge I was sure anyone in the lobby could see them through the curtain that separates it from the performance space. So I prepared myself for two hours of such overly dramatic physicality, after first cursing director Jennifer Popple for casting Cerny as a son in playwright Nina Raine's troubled-family saga.

It didn't take long, however, for Cerny to completely change my mind, as it became clear that his Daniel is, himself, over-dramatic, given that his manic figure hears voices in his head. Cerny's characterization, it turns out, isn't bad acting; it's actually spot-on, and moved me from initial dislike - agreeing with Michael Carron's crotchety, opinionated patriarch Christopher that Daniel should "F--- off!" - to sympathetic pity for this troubled person. It was also through Daniel's viewpoint that I experienced Raine's story of a constantly arguing family that cruelly teases each other, with their only sense of grounding coming from Calvin Vo's Billy, the clan's ever-patient, deaf-from-birth younger son.

Cayte McClanathan, Mollie Schmelzner, and Michael Carron in Twelfth NightLike a few dozen other optimistic souls, I attended Saturday's Genesius Guild production of Twelfth Night hoping that the threatened thunderstorms would bypass the Quad Cities, or at least Rock Island's Lincoln Park, for three hours or so. Alas, Shakespeare's game was called on account of rain (and some major lightning) at roughly 8:30 p.m., so those of us who were willing and able were invited to return to see the rest of the show, and its opening half-hour again, on Sunday.

Calvin Vo and Bryan Woods in The AcharniansThis year's end-of-season Greek comedy by Genesius Guild, The Acharnians, is high on political humor, musical numbers, and sharply funny barbs at the expense of local organizations - especially Genesis Health System and Trinity Regional Health System (now UnityPoint Health) - and the cities of Moline, Davenport, and Rock Island. And I was smiling from ear to ear during almost the entirety of Saturday's performance, tickled by the clever jokes, amusing songs, and even the groan-worthy puns.

Augustana College's production of subUrbia features one of the most (if not the most) layered and fascinating sets I've yet seen on a local stage, as Adam Parboosingh's scenic design manages to give us both a brick storefront - including parking spaces, cement parking bumps, scaffolding, a dumpster, and even a period-appropriate, mid-'90s pay phone - and the fully stocked interior of a convenience store at the same time. Consequently, Parboosingh's set rendered Friday's performance interesting well before the play even started, offering much to take in visually while we waited for the proverbial curtain to rise.

Calvin Vo in The Bock EyeFriday's world-premiere performance of playwright Tommy Smith's The Bock Eye - a modernized adaptation of Euripides' The Bacchae - seemed much longer than the 60 minutes it runs from beginning to end. That's not, however, because the piece is dull, or because director Saffron Henke's pacing is too slow. It's because the production is so packed with entertainment and clever and hilarious lines that it seems too much to be contained in just one hour. I enjoyed Augustana College's presentation of this new work so greatly that I was a bit exhausted at its end, and gasped when I looked at my phone and saw that it was only 8:30; I was shocked that I could laugh so much in so little time.

Lilli Pickens, Samantha Kammerman, and Bill Cahill in Bat Boy: The MusicalA musical based on the Weekly World News' tabloid-famous Bat Boy screams "camp." Augustana College's production of Bat Boy: The Musical, however, is not campy enough, as a couple of the leading actors played their parts too seriously or sincerely during Friday's performance, softening the effect of this musical's craziness.

Andrea Millea and Joe Urbaitis in South PacificSouth Pacific comes to us with an intimidating load of pedigreed baggage: Pulitzer Prizes, Tony Awards, Rodgers & Hammerstein. And if you add its dramatic World War II setting, its themes of interracial romance and prejudice, its enormous scenic drops and set pieces, and its cast of two dozen plus, it'd be enough for Countryside Community Theatre's current production of the piece to be impressive, and it most certainly is that.