There are a couple of theater openings this weekend with productions at ACT Theatre and On the Boards hitting the stage, while Seattle Rep heads into its closing weekend performances. All three are worth catching if you can fit them in.

ACT Theatre

Every Brilliant Thing

Ice cream and water fights, and a whole lot more – in fact a million of them. These are the things worth living for in ACT’s latest production, “Every Brilliant Thing.”

This one-person play has warmed hearts across the globe and will certainly unthaw any wintered over emotions in Seattle theatergoers.

Originally performed at the Ludlow Fringe Festival in 2013, “Every Brilliant Thing” has captured and bottled pure wonderment. A story that found its roots in a child who composed a list of brilliant things in life to cope with their mom’s mental illness, “Every Brilliant Thing” forms a special interaction and immediacy with the audience.

ACT patrons will be in good hands for this heart-felt and funny ride as Ian Bell (A Christmas Carol, Trip to Bountiful, The Pillowman, Black Coffee) takes us through an emotional journey via comedy, improve and audience interaction.

Playful as it may be, one of the oft quoted lines of “Every Brilliant Thing” ties it up nicely: “If you live a long life and get to the end of it without ever once having felt crushingly depressed, then you probably haven’t been paying attention.”

“Every Brilliant Thing” opens Thursday, March 23 and runs through April 2.

On The Boards

UN-[TITLED]

If you think the soul of Seattle has changed in the past five to 10 years (or even the last two), the latest work at On the Boards may help you make sense of it all. In “UN-[TITLED],” theater and community artists come together to visit and create a sense of place and healing in communities that have felt the impact of development and gentrification.

This multisite experience takes place over the weekend in the Central and Chinatown-International Districts of Seattle. Throughout the two hour performance you’ll join artists, architects, developers and community organizers to explore the meaning of home and the role we play in displacement and gentrification (and how we can build supportive and healing relationships).

Expect oral history, music and poetry along the way as shuttles whisk you between locations.

“UN-[TITLED]” runs at On the Boards March 23-26.

Seattle Rep

Between Two Knees

If you like the hit TV show “Reservation Dogs” it’s a good bet that you’ll like the latest production at the Rep, “Between Two Knees.”  That’s because the same intertribal sketch comedy troupe responsible for the Hulu series, is behind the latest production to hit the Rep’s stage.

This is the first play by the troupe, which goes by The 1491s, and their send up leaves no one untouched. As the name suggests the action centers around Wounded Knee. Bookended by the massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890 and the protest that took place in 1973, “Between Two Knees” can be challenging, enlightening, absurd…and laugh out loud funny.

Through all the laughs, there is undoubtedly a serious history lesson to take away – one that you likely never got from your school books.

“Between Two Knees” runs through March 26 at Seattle Rep.