To celebrate the 50th anniversary of Theatre Bay Area (TBA) this year, the nonprofit organization’s vice president, Shireen Wetmore, set herself a personal goal, vowing to see 50 theater pieces by year's end. She started her theater-going marathon in January and now, approaching the end of the year, she has met her goal halfway and is jazzed and ready for the multiple activities that comprise Bay Area Theatre Week (September 10-20).

Theatre Week links theater-lovers (and the theater-curious) to plays in a variety of ways. Perhaps the biggest draw is the discounts on shows and workshops that participating theater companies offer, as well as open rehearsals and other special events.

Theatre Week dates back to 1983 and is not just a chance to score low-price tickets; it’s also a time for theatre goers to schmooze, says Wetmore, who’s been on TBA’s board for three years now. She refers to a recent addition to the lineup of activities: a happy hour where one can discuss the shows with other audience members and theatre artists. Last year, about 50 theatres signed on to Theatre Week.

Even amidst the much-lamented recent closures of such beloved companies as Aurora Theatre, Central Works, Cal Shakes and others, the Bay Area has the highest concentration of regional theatre companies in the U.S., and, says TBA, is second only to the New York City metropolitan area in its ability to support stage actors with a livable income. TBA itself is the oldest and largest theatre-arts nonprofit organization of its kind in the country.

Theatre Week has gone through various evolutions, says TBA marketing and communications director Hilary Buffum. Last year, for example, backstage tours were added. This year, she notes, you can pick up a keepsake: little passport-style booklets, available at TBA’s kickoff party and elsewhere, to be stamped at theatres to memorialize every show you see.

The major attraction is the ticket discounts. Some companies offer 20- to 30% discounts, others $20 tickets, or $10 discounts. Town Hall Theatre Co. in Lafayette, for one, will take 60% off the usual price.

Wetmore muses that San Francisco is finally coming back after the pandemic, and, she says, “It’s especially our quirky theater that helps express the culture of San Francisco.”

Quirky or not, perhaps the most surprising production — with a substantial 30% discount ­— is at the Bay Area’s flagship theater, American Conservatory Theatre, long known for classics, world premieres, musicals and comedies. The 1959 Alfred Hitchcock film “North by Northwest” is indeed a departure, but something special: It’s adapted and directed by British theater wizard Emma Rice and was staged at The Old Globe in London recently. (We last saw a Rice-created production when Berkeley Rep brought her dazzling “The Wild Bride” here in 2013.) For “North by Northwest,” eight actors play varied roles; the mistaken identity scenario and nerve-wracking chase scenes are intact (including the famous crop-duster nail-biter, albeit with imaginative props, particularly lots of suitcases) The soundtrack is circa 1950s and there’s plenty of humor, as well. ACT is also offering a free Introduction to Theatre Appreciation on September 13, and a discount on a Young Conservatory workshop.

The guaranteed funniest play by a local playwright, Jonathan Spector, is the Tony Award-winning “Eureka Day,” which premiered in 2018 at Aurora Theatre in Berkeley, was produced at Marin Theatre this season, and is onstage during Theater Week in the South Bay, at City Lights in San Jose. If you’ve never seen a play so hilarious that at times you can barely hear the dialogue over the roaring laughter, this is your chance. (But it’s not only comic; after all, it’s about the vaccination controversy.) Spector’s latest play, “Birthright,” recently closed off-Broadway to a rapturous New York Times review.

Berkeley Rep opens its season with Cuban playwright Eduardo Machado’s “The Cook,” at a 20% discount. The play, which premiered in New York in 2003, begins in 1958 just as Castro is taking control in Havana. The central character, Gladys, the cook, promises the estate owners, who are fleeing to the U.S., to safeguard the house for their anticipated return. Berkeley Rep describes it as “sharp, funny, and quietly devastating.”

Check out “The White Chip” at Marin Theatre, which is offering a 30% ticket discount during Theatre Week. This is Marin Theatre’s 60th anniversary; the “semi-autobiographical comedy” by Sean Daniels explores addiction and recovery (directed by Marin Theatre artistic/executive director Lance Gardner, who’s near his 20th year of sobriety.)

How many blood-sucking vampires are too many? When it comes to the stage, the more the merrier. Following a recent SF Playhouse production, Orinda Starlight Village Players’ production of “Dracula” (opens September 4) which precedes TheatreWorks' version in October. In Orinda, company collaborator Malcolm S. Cowler uses video projections, audio recordings and live performance to tell the grisly story resembling a black-and-white movie.

→ Bay Area Theatre Week
September 10-20. theatrebayarea.org

See Theatre Highlights pages for more theatre previews

1987 inaugural Bay Area Theatre Week. Photo by David Allen