CAROUSEL | Julianne Boyd directs Rodgers & Hammerstein's classic 1945 musical about carnival roustabout Billy Bigelow, who finds a wife in millworker Julie Jordan but not happiness. With Aaron Ramey as Billy and Patricia Noonan as Julie, plus "June Is Bustin' Out All Over," "If I Loved You," "My Boy Bill/My Little Girl," and "You'll Never Walk Alone." | Barrington Stage Company, 30 Union St, Pittsfield | 413.236.8888 | Through July 11 | Curtain 7 pm Tues | 2 + 7 pm Wed | 8 pm Thurs | 2+ 8 pm Fri | 8 pm Sat [no June 27] | 5 pm Sun | $42-$50
THE COLOR PURPLE | The Broadway hit (it did run for two years) based on the Alice Walker novel and the Steven Spielberg movie makes its Boston debut, with three actresses from the Broadway production — Kenita Miller as Celie, Felicia P. Fields (Tony-nominated) as Sofia, and Angela Robinson as Shug Avery — plus Rufus Bonds Jr. (Mufasa in the Broadway Lion King) as Mister and LaToya London as Nettie. Gary Griffin, also from the Broadway production, directs. | Wang Theatre, 270 Tremont St, Boston | 866.348.9738 | Through June 28 | Curtain 8 pm Thurs-Fri | 2 + 8 pm Sat | 1 + 7 pm Sun | $28-$100
DEAR MISS GARLAND | Local hero Kathy St. George channels her favorite movie star ("We are exactly the same height, 4'11" ") in the world premiere of a one-woman show that she wrote with Scott Edmiston. Musical director Jim Rice heads the seven-piece band. | Stoneham Theatre, 395 Main St, Stoneham | 781.279.2200 | Through June 28 | Curtain 7:30 pm Thurs | 8 pm Fri | 4 + 8 pm Sat | 2 pm Sun | $40; $35 seniors; $20 students
DIVIDING THE ESTATE | Well, that's the question in the late Horton Foote's Tony-nominated play, whose production has moved to Hartford Stage after getting closed down on Broadway in January. Texas matriarch Stella Gordon wants to keep the 100-year-old family estate intact, even though its time seems to have passed. Her three children are more interested in the title activity. The production is directed by Hartford artistic director Michael Wilson (which is partly why it wound up in Hartford), and it's pitch-perfect; the performances marry sweetness to satire, with Hallie Foote's Tony-nominated turn as Mary Jo the most daringly broad. | Hartford Stage, 50 Church St, Hartford | 860.527.5151 | Through July 5 | Curtain 7:30 pm Thurs [no July 2] | 8 pm Fri [no July 3] | 2 + 8 pm [no performances July 4] Sat | 2 pm Sun | $23-$68
DREAM OF LIFE | Imaginary Beasts presents Federico García Lorca's unfinished drama Play Without a Title, in which "revolution breaks out in the streets, and in the theater a director interrupts a performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream to demand that the actors and the audience invite the revolution inside." The piece is accompanied by García Lorca's "highly experimental 'diálogos,' including the rarely seen Buster Keaton Takes a Walk. Passionate, surreal and personal, the diálogos unfold like waking dreams and exemplify Lorca's conviction for "impossible" theater." | BCA Plaza Black Box Theatre, 539 Tremont St, Boston | 978.500.5553 | Through June 27 | Curtain 7:30 pm Thurs | 8 pm Fri | 4 pm [June 27] + 8 pm Sat | $18; $13 students, seniors
