This month, two new exciting productions, Sound House by Stephanie Fleischmann and This is the Color Described by the Time, conceived and directed by Lily Whitsitt, radically reimagine theater making, with symphonic results.

Current images of protesters filling the streets recall earlier eras of dissent, namely the 1960s, when the Civil Rights Movement, the anti-war movement, and second-wave feminists flooded the streets with people determined to change civil discourse.

The shadows grow longer as the harvest moon rises above a glittering skyline, signaling the approach of fall, a time of civic rituals that have become synonymous with life in New York—Fashion Week, Little Italy’s San Gennaro Festival, the Columbus Day Parade, culminating in the jewel in the crown of our city’s autumn bacchanalia: Halloween.

As Cats claws its way back to Broadway and producers rub their palms envisioning yet another billion-dollar season, creator/director Joshua William Gelb and producer Moe Yousuf know now is the perfect time to reanimate the theatrical behemoth that started it all: Charles M. Barras’s 1866 marvel, The Black Crook.

The Working Theater has spent the past 25 years producing theater that focuses on the struggles of ordinary people. Their newest production, opening in January on Theater Row, is Stefanie Zadravec’s Honey Brown Eyes (Helen Hayes Award recipient for Best Play 2009).