"It's a play I've admired for a long time, and no one in the play is anything less than despicable," says Futz director Ron Willis. He calls it a parable that questions where the boundary is between "individual freedom and victimless crime." Performances run through February 20 at the Lawrence Arts Center (940 New Hampshire, 785-843-2787); tickets are $6. -- Steve Walker
Do the Deed
A hometown chorus goes blue during the
red-heart season.
2/11-2/13
Delving into 16th-century madrigals, Victorian-era standards, Shakespearean ditties and bawdy tavern tunes, the Kansas City Singers provide historical context with their upcoming performances, which include numbers with euphemistically bold lines such as If all them young laddies were butchers so sweet/I'd hang on their hooks, and I'd pound on their meat. Though not Eminem-explicit, Making Love is raunchy enough that parents must accompany spectators younger than 17. (Of course, racy material is about the only thing that would make unsupervised teenagers want to attend a quasi-classical concert.) As a souvenir, concertgoers can grab a calendar that depicts the singers and their partners in, um, provocative poses. The series starts with a reception at 7 p.m. Friday at the Just Off Broadway Theater (3051 Central); additional sets follow at 8 p.m. Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday. Call 816-361-0431. -- Andrew Miller
Neo-Soul Sister
Sharon Jones gets her groove on.
2/11-2/12
Sharon Jones might be the best singer you've never heard of. She frequently merits comparisons to James Brown protégées Marva Whitney (a KC native) and Lyn Collins; her latest album, Naturally, has earned über-flattering reviews; and a recent knock-'em-dead performance on Late Night With Conan O'Brien scored her legions of unlikely fans. Yet she's still relatively unknown. Maybe this weekend will change that -- locally, anyway. The funk revivalist and her band, the Dap Kings, follow the Golden Republic's 7 p.m. show Friday at the Bottleneck (737 New Hampshire in Lawrence, 785-841-5483), before heading to the Music Café (120 South Ninth Street in Columbia, 573-815-9995) for a 7:45 p.m. show Saturday. -- Annie Fischer
Made in Taiwan
SAT 2/12
While the leaders of Western civilization were splitting each other's skulls with bronze weapons and feeding their enemies to lions in arenas, entertainers of the Han Dynasty of China were developing stunts -- mostly involving household objects -- that are still astonishing 2,000 years later. See the National Acrobats of Taiwan at 8 p.m. Saturday at the Folly Theater (301 West 11th Street). Call 816-415-5025. -- Jason Harper
