Last Chance

Theater

The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife--Valerie Harper’s eyes roll. Her eyebrows rise. She flings her hands toward the ceiling. This is not the time or place for subtlety. This is the Ahmanson Theatre stage, and Harper is playing Marjorie in Charles Busch’s “The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife.” Busch describes Marjorie in his stage directions: “She’s in the throes of an epic depression. It’s not quiet depression but raging frustration. She’s a volcano that explodes, simmers down and then explodes again.” Did we mention that this play is primarily a comedy? Yes, Busch believes that volatile Marjorie, her more-altruistic-than-thou husband, Ira (Tony Roberts), and her brutally candid little mother, Frieda (Shirl Bernheim), are hilarious. For much of the evening, he’s right. The play has a go-for-the-joke ethos that stops short of brilliant revelations. Obsessive and neurotic New York Jews are not unfamiliar targets of satire, however, and Busch’s subject matter doesn’t venture beyond Woody Allen territory.

Don Shirley

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Ends Sunday at the Ahmanson Theatre, 135 N. Grand Ave., L.A., (213) 628-2772.

Also closing this weekend:

The Waverly Gallery --Playwright Kenneth Lonergan’s drama depicting the effects of dementia on an aged gallery owner (Eve Roberts) and her family ends Sunday at Pasadena Playhouse, 39 S. El Molino Ave., Pasadena, (626) 356-7529.

Goose & Tomtom --David Rabe’s dark comedy examining the American psyche and the power of imagination ends Sunday at the Edison Theatre, 213 E. Broadway, Long Beach, (562) 433-8337.

In Their Own Words: Celebrity Autobiographies --This tickling literary cabaret of excerpted celebrity memoirs, from Zsa Zsa to Mr. T, ends Sunday at the Bar F2, 143 N. La Brea Ave., L.A., (323) 769-5511.