Oct 23, 2012 4 min read

As one of the girls in Mary McCarthy’s novel “The Group” chirps whenever she is too perplexed to say anything else, “Who’d a thunk it?”Surprising lately is the resurgence in popularity of the Mel Brooks musical from a decade ago, “The Producers,” which has come back to this area in two unrelated productions. The first continues through Sunday at the Pittsburgh Playhouse. The second opens 11 days later at Stage 62 in Carnegie.Who’d a thunk that?”I’ve done operas, but as far as a musical, it’s the largest project I’ve done,” Tome Cousin told Pittsburgh Post-Gazette writer Sharon Eberson about directing and choreographing the show for Point Park University’s Conservatory Theatre Company. “Luckily, I have two incredible people working with me,” he added, meaning associate choreographer Lauren Kadel and actress Kimberly Hester, who appeared in four Broadways shows, including “The Producers.”Cousin also has a fine cast of Point Park actors led by Tom Driscoll as swindling showman Max Bialystock and Carter Ellis as Max’s mousy cohort, Leo Bloom. “These students, still learning their craft, have the class to make this production a hoot, full of style,” wrote a Pittsburgh theater critic, Gordon Spencer.With the detail-obsessed Stephen Santa directing, Stage 62’s “The Producers” should have plenty of style and splendor, too.But at this point, during the exhausting rehearsal period, it’s “a very challenging production to mount,” Santa told me, referring to the number of actors (36), the variety of costumes (from 1950s street clothes to flashy chorus-girl outfits to a few Third Reich uniforms) and the complicated set changes.To get through the process, he’s counting on his “dedicated, hardworking” production team, a group composed of choreographer Nathan Hart, costumer Shannon Brendel, set designer Jen James, scenic artist Adrienne Fischer, music director Cynthia Dougherty, stage manager Caitlin Skaff and assistant stage manager Andrea Carriker.He’s also happy about his cast, starting with David Cary as Max and Chris Martin as Leo, and including Sara Barbisch, Seamus Ricci, Rob James, Carl Hunt, Arlene Merryman, Bertha McGinnis and Ed Gergerich in supporting roles.Together, “we’re working a great deal on making our production unique and smart,” Santa said. “We’re also laughing and sweating a lot in rehearsals, which makes for a great time.””The Producers” runs through Nov 18 at Stage 62’s longtime venue, the Andrew Carnegie Free Library and Music Hall. For reservations, call 412-429-6262.

Just in time for Halloween, producers Jude and Shirley Pohl are offering “Lights! Camera! Murder!” at the Crowne Plaza Cabaret Dinner Theatre in Bethel Park. The show, another one of those audience-participation murder mysteries that have become reliable moneymakers for the couple, doesn’t contain a Halloween theme, but any plot ripe with scheming, skullduggery and a dead body (all in the name of fun, of course) fits the occasion, doesn’t it?”Lights! Camera! Murder!” stars Gary Baughman, Susan Franz, Carol Ann Johnson, Vic Kleman, John Schussler, Bill Slivka and Carol Stasik. It opens Saturday and continues, weekends only, through Nov. 11.The Pohls will close the year with “A Funny, Nunny Christmas” (Nov. 30-Dec. 15) and Walt Maddox’s one-man show, “Nat: A Tribute to Nat King Cole” (Nov. 23 and Dec. 28 and 29).For reservations, call 724-746-1178.

If you’re a Showtime subscriber, keep your eyes open for a wonderful new documentary called “That Guy … Who Was in That Thing.”Ian Roumain and Michael Schwartz directed an entertaining visit with 16 troupers who are true character actors, known, respected, lauded, etc., but (unlike George Clooney, Denzel Washington and Brad Pitt) more famous for the people they play in movies and on TV than they are for being themselves.Among the actors interviewed: Bruce Davison, Paul Guilfoyle, Mark Rolston, Matt Malloy, Robert Joy, Rick Worthy, Xander Berkeley, Craig Fairbrass, Timothy Omundson, Wade Williams, J.C. Mackenzie, Zach Grenier, William Morgan Sheppard, Gregory Itzin, Stanley Kamel and Zeljko Ivanek.If you’re wondering who they are, that’s half the point.But you’ll recognize them, and that’s the other half.