At play in Orange County

Professional Theaters

* South Coast Repertory, Costa Mesa. (714) 708-5555; www.scr.org.

The synopsis: Founded in 1964, the flagship of Orange County theater. Artistic directors David Emmes and Martin Benson decided in the early 1980s to make a national mark by commissioning and producing new plays; SCR won the 1988 Tony Award as best regional theater. SCR-spawned plays that have won acclaim include Margaret Edson’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “Wit,” Richard Greenberg’s “Three Days of Rain,” Rolin Jones’ “The Intelligent Design of Jenny Chow” and Donald Margulies’ “Collected Stories” and “Sight Unseen.”

Now playing: Margulies’ SCR-commissioned “Brooklyn Boy” premieres Sept. 10, with a Broadway run to follow. It’s the first of four plays having world premieres at SCR next season.

Next act: Emmes, Benson and the SCR board plan to pick the founders’ successor within five years -- somebody, according to Benson, who comes from a stage-directing rather than a managerial background, and who will already have established a working relationship with SCR.

* Laguna Playhouse, Laguna Beach. (949) 497-2787; www.lagunaplayhouse.com

The synopsis: Orange County’s oldest theater company; staged its first production in 1922 and was a highly regarded community theater for more than 70 years. Attained fully professional status in 1995 under current directors Richard Stein and Andrew Barnicle. Eclectic programming includes popular fare, but emphasis is on presenting plays previously unseen in Southern California, including Neil LaBute’s “The Shape of Things,” Rebecca Gilman’s “Spinning Into Butter” and Lonnie Carter and the Ma-Yi Theatre Company’s “The Romance of Magno Rubio.”

Now playing: “Forever Plaid”

Next act: Ability to narrow prestige gap with SCR will probably depend on establishing a second stage, a goal delayed by this decade’s economic doldrums.

* Grove Theater Center, Garden Grove. (714) 741-9555; www.gtc.org

The synopsis: Professional theater as a pop-and-pop shop. Directors Kevin Cochran and Charles Johanson have worn many hats, from directing to moving scenery and selling refreshments, while keeping the company alive since 1994 through financial struggles; diverse artistic agenda calls for an annual Shakespeare production, popular comedies such as A.R. Gurney’s “Sylvia” and adventurous dramatic choices including Elmer Rice’s “The Adding Machine.” They also operate a smaller sister theater in L.A. County, the GTC Burbank.

Now playing: “The Beckett Project II,” an evening of short plays by Samuel Beckett.

Next act: Its ambition is to progress beyond survival mode through as-yet-unrealized marketing and fundraising leaps and make the 172-seat Gem Theater a regional stage of note.

* Shakespeare Orange County, Garden Grove. (714) 744-7016; www.chapman.edu/Shakespeare

The synopsis: Launched in 1992 at Chapman University after founder Thomas F. Bradac’s resignation from Grove Shakespeare, the company he started in 1979. Now back in Bradac’s old digs, the 550-seat outdoor Festival Amphitheater in Garden Grove. Veteran Shakespearean actor-directors Carl Reggiardo, Michael Nehring and Donald Sage Mackay are company anchors.

Now playing: “Much Ado About Nothing”; next up, “Macbeth,” Aug. 5

Next act: Aiming to draw 5,000 patrons in return outdoor season and build from there, hoping eventually to boost budget from $100,000 to $500,000.

* Fullerton Civic Light Opera, Fullerton. (714) 879-1732; www.fclo.com

The synopsis: Founded in 1972; housed in the county’s most venerable hall, the 1,300-seat, 1934-vintage Plummer Auditorium. Builds its seasons around standard hit musicals, but co-founders Griff and Jan Duncan sometimes veer into less-trodden territory, such as the 2000 West Coast premiere of “Mirette,” by Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt.

Now playing: “The Tin Pan Alley Rag”

Next act: An “international” season in 2005 to follow this year’s “Americana” theme; includes David Henry Hwang’s updating of “Flower Drum Song” and “Once on This Island,” an Afro-Caribbean retelling of “The Little Mermaid.”

* Saddleback Civic Light Opera, Mission Viejo. (949) 582-4500; www.sclo.org

The synopsis: Founded in 1978, and led for the past 20 years by producer Geof English, it programs two well-known titles each summer at the 405-seat McKinney Theatre on the Saddleback College campus, as well as a cabaret show.

Now playing: “Singin’ in the Rain” and “Route 66” cabaret revue.

Next act: English aims to produce not only revues but also new and less familiar musicals in the 85-seat cabaret theater.

Small Theaters

* Chance Theater, Anaheim Hills. (714) 777-3033; www.chancetheater.com

The synopsis: Founded in 1999 by artistic director Oanh Nguyen and friends. After falling in debt with an opening season of plays by unknowns, the company hit on Gilbert & Sullivan as an artistically credible -- and royalty-free -- attraction to build an audience. Now solvent, with a budget that Nguyen says tops $100,000, the Chance is the county’s most prolific and eclectic small company, running two plays in repertory in its 50-seat space while programming a mix of familiar titles, previously unseen works and classics.

Now playing: Rodgers & Hammerstein revue “A Grand Night for Singing” and “Second Annual First Chance Fest,” a program of short plays including new and unfamiliar scripts as well as works by Moliere and Caryl Churchill.

Next act: Nguyen often directs but never has acted in a Chance show. But you can see him at the cineplex, playing an unhappy Cambodian prince who soliloquizes about his troubles to a caged tiger in the film “Two Brothers.”

* Hunger Artists Theatre Company, Fullerton. (714) 680-6803; www.hungerartists.com

The synopsis: Created in 1996 from Orange Coast College’s drama department; known for what artistic director Kelly Flynn calls “bastardizations” of classic plays -- freely rewritten adaptations that include O.C. playwright Kristina Leach’s recent updating of “Medea” to the contemporary corporate world, and “White Trash Privit Lives,” Flynn’s transplantation of Noel Coward’s “Private Lives” from tony British precincts to a Texas trailer park.

Now playing: Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman’s “Assassins,” a follow-up to last year’s well-received Sondheim musical “Sweeney Todd”

Next act: Its first production, “Madame Guignol’s Macabre Theatre,” answered a friend’s dare to “start an Orange County Halloween tradition that’s not Knott’s Berry Farm.” The sexily spooky show has been a perennially hot ticket, with new script by the company each year. Look for it in the fall.

* Insurgo Theater Movement, Anaheim Hills. (714) 517-7798; www.insurgotheater.com

The synopsis: Founded in 2001 by artistic director John Beane and his wife, Jessica. Shakespeare and modern classics such as “Waiting for Godot” and the upcoming “Loot,” by Joe Orton, dominate programming; company has made its mark by emphasizing heated, elaborately choreographed battle scenes in some of the Bard’s bloodier plays, and a knockabout big-top aesthetic in its comedies.

Now playing: “Richard III”

Next act: Will launch a 32-part foray into weekly episodic theater in late summer with “The Unbelievers,” a late-night production created by company members.

* Maverick Theater, currently itinerant. (714) 634-1977; www.mavericktheater.com

The synopsis: Started in 2002 to extend the life of “The King,” founder Brian Newell’s musical about the return of Elvis Presley, first seen at Stagestheatre. Was the theater in a mall until it got the boot this spring.

Now playing: “The King,” the most popular play launched on the O.C. small-theater scene, has its fourth revival starting Aug. 6 at the Buena Park Civic Theater.

Next act: Finding a new home. Newell considers himself a bit of a black sheep on the scene because of his penchant for the tried and true, such as “It’s a Wonderful Life,” “The Rocky Horror Show” and “Frankenstein.” He says it’s the way to win a young new audience for theater.

* Rude Guerrilla Theater Company, Santa Ana. (714) 547-4688; www.rudeguerrilla.org

The synopsis: Founded in 1997. Easily the most daring and politicized theater company in the county, owing to artistic director Dave Barton’s ethic forged during his days as local leader of the militant AIDS-fighting coalition ACT-UP. Makes room for closer-to-the-mainstream fare such as Peter Shaffer’s “Equus” and Yasmina Reza’s “Art,” but the shows Barton directs himself almost always pack a punch in the gut, with unsparing depictions of sex and violence.

Now playing: “Blasted” at GTC Burbank; “Poona ... and Other Plays for Children,” by Jeff Goode, in Santa Ana. Hosting the Rogue Artists Ensemble’s puppet-and-mask play, “Hyperbole: Changes,” as a late-night show.

Next act: Rude Guerrilla plans to move within the county in the coming year due to an expected rent increase at its downtown Santa Ana storefront.

* Stagestheatre, Fullerton. (714) 525-4484; www.stagesentertainment.com

The synopsis: Originally known as Stages, emerging from the Fullerton College theater department in 1992 as a laboratory where any member with a creative idea was encouraged to try it in front of an audience. Founding director Brian Kojac didn’t allow reviewers for the first few years. His successor, Patrick Gwaltney, has reined in the anything-goes production schedule to present more traditionally structured seasons mixing classics, cash cows (the recent “Jesus Christ Superstar”) and new plays by a stable of local writers.

Now playing: “Hedda Gabler”

Next act: New plays have often been about famous protagonists, including doomed rocker Johnny Thunders (“So Alone”), visionary poet William Blake (“Prophets, Profit and William Blake”) and ballplayer Rube Waddell (“Rube!”); the next one, “Roscoe Spitzer Is Afraid of Dying,” is an entirely fanciful story of a struggling folksinger.

* Vanguard Theatre Ensemble, Fullerton. (714) 526-8007; www.vte.org

The synopsis: Founded in 1992. Aims to give a cohesive acting company a chance to delve into proven scripts -- mainly classics and artistically ambitious contemporary works.

Now playing: “Dial ‘M’ for Murder,” by Frederick Knott

Next act: Many members left during a two-year hiatus while the company found and remodeled its new location; holdovers and new recruits must reestablish the troupe with a season that includes “The Glass Menagerie,” “The Lion in Winter” and Nicky Silver’s “Raised in Captivity.” If the comeback succeeds, artistic director Wade Williamson wants to expand seasons, opening slots for new and unproven plays.