Tradition has it that Queen Elizabeth commissioned the Bard to write this play because she wished to see Falstaff in love.

Apocryphal or not, public pressure seems to have been involved in the return of that ultimate hedonist to the stage after his unceremonious dismissal by the newly serious King Henry V, formerly the fun-loving Prince Hal.

The result was The Merry Wives of Windsor, playing through Sept. 28 on the Lowell Davies Festival Stage as part of The Old Globe’s summer Shakespeare festival. Paul Mullins directs.

Merry Wives is the only one of the Bard’s comedies set in Shakespeare’s homeland, and probably the only one written for a state occasion: the induction of Shakespeare’s patron George Carey into the Order of the Garter.

Merry Wives is Shakespeare for people who think they hate Shakespeare. It contains little poetry, no substance, no complicated plot. It is simply a slapstick romp featuring silliness, good-natured trickery, bawdy jokes and (since Director Paul Mullins has set it in the Wild West) dancing girls.

The plot is simple: the porky Falstaff (Eric Hoffmann), a rogue who lives by robbery and plunder, fancies himself a great lothario. He’s fallen on hard economic times, and concocts a goofy plot to romance Mistress Ford (Katie MacNichol) and Mistress Page (Celeste Ciulla), who hold their respective family purse strings, in order to extract money from them.

He sends them identical letters proposing a tryst, but the ladies are way ahead of him: they compare letters and invent their own schemes to embarrass him. Meanwhile Mr. Ford (Bruce Turk), out of the loop for the first two escapades, provides some hilarity with his jealous responses, while Mr. Page (Nat McIntyre) busies himself trying to line up a groom for daughter Anne (Carolyn Ratteray).

This secondary plot provides three more interesting characters: Anne’s suitors. Fine performances are on view from Wynn Harmon as French physician Caius, outrageously dressed and utterly full of himself; Justice Shallow’s nephew Slender (Sloan Grenz), who has trouble getting a sentence out; and Anne’s choice, the perfectly reasonable (but poor) Fenton (Owiso Odera).

Costume designer Denitsa Bliznakova does herself proud with some terrific dresses for the ladies, but it’s the sight of pistol-packin’ Falstaff prancing around in a fringed buckskin jacket and 10-gallon hat that provokes guffaws, especially when you see this tub of lard stuffed into a laundry basket. Hoffmann is a hoot as the fat elf, whose king-sized ego blinds him to the ludicrous figure he cuts.

Ciulla and MacNichol and their little pranks are terrifically engaging, proving that “wives may be merry and yet honest too” and that Shakespeare can speak to just plain folks as well as academics.

The Merry Wives of Windsor plays through Sept. 28 in rotation with All’s Well That Ends Well and Romeo and Juliet at the Lowell Davies Festival Stage. For tickets, call 619-233-5623 or visit www.theoldglobe.org.

Romance, regret, possibility and the dance of life (usually to strains of Johann Strauss) meet in John Patrick Shanley’s Sailor’s Song, in a repeat engagement through Aug. 24 at New Village Arts Theatre. Kristianne Kurner directs a slightly different cast in this play rife with quirky characters, frequently funny dialogue, flights of fancy and dance.

Commercial fisherman Rich (this time played by Joshua Everett Johnson) comes to a small southeastern seaboard town to visit his Uncle John (now played by Manny Fernandes) and his dying Aunt Carla (Robin Christ). Rich is at a crossroad himself: Fishing has been good to him, but he’s getting itchy for a change … or maybe he just needs to fall in love. “I gotta hope my heart has a fate that’s gonna jump out at me,” he says.

A detour to a seaside bar brings him a romantic choice many men dream about when he meets sisters Lucy (Amanda Morrow) and Joan (Amanda Sitton). Lucy is lovely and very much grounded in reality, offering safety and security. Joan is a bit of a space cadet, a droll automatic writer currently channeling a Punjabi salesman who died in Atlantic City. Each beguiles Rich in her own way.

Will he choose? Should he? Must he? Uncle John, coping with the sad reality of Carla’s imminent death, offers Rich this insight: “For every man, there are two women: the one you’re with and the one you could be with … possibility. But you must pick one.”

But Rich prefers the happy haze of romance, where a walk with Lucy is magically accompanied by a Strauss waltz and they find themselves dancing.

In fact, dance features prominently in Sailor’s Song. Rich’s first lines are, “If you could dance with the days of your life, if you could take life by the wrist and dance, I think it would be a waltz. Forward and back, sad and happy, high and low.” Everyone dances here, even the dead Carla, in moves strong and beautiful, magical and sexy.

Sitton’s comedic talent is in high gear; her portrayal of Joan’s whacked-out psyche is both howlingly funny and irresistibly seductive. Morrow maximizes her girl-next-door role, and Johnson’s angular, tentative Rich is irresistible. Fernandes (who played Rich in the last incarnation) is solid as the down-to-earth Uncle John.

Shanley, best known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning Doubt and the charmingly romantic screenplay for Moonstruck, takes us on an odyssey (there’s even a rowboat that moves) into the human desire for love and connection even in the face of death and separation.

I suppose one could carp that Sailor’s Song is lightweight fare, but Kurner’s deft directorial touch and Christ’s lovely choreography create a delightful evening of enchantment. At a time when political and social realities impose a soul-crushing load on all of us, it’s good to be invited to the dance of life.

Sailor’s Song plays through Aug. 24, at New Village Arts Theatre in Carlsbad. Shows Thursday and Friday at 8 p.m.; Saturday at 3 and 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. For tickets, call 760-433-3245 or visit www.newvillagearts.org.

Oh, those boomers – the largest generation in U.S. history, 76 million strong, born between 1946 and 1964. What a mob. What a generation. What a show!

Lamb’s Players Theatre presents an open-ended run of its much-loved homegrown show Boomers at the Horton Grand Theatre, its newly acquired second facility in Downtown San Diego.

Co-written (with Vanda Eggington) and directed by Lamb’s staffer Kerry Meads, Boomers is a bouncy, tuneful valentine to that noisy generation that claims to have both invented free love and stopped the Vietnam War. First presented in 1993, Boomers has been on the boards several times since then with minor tweaks. This time around, menopause, global warming and the possibility of electing a black president are mentioned.

An audience participation “Name That Tune” game opens the festivities with songs known to many in the audience: the terrific stage band (Patrick Marion on keyboards, Rik Ogden, guitar and woodwinds, Oliver Shirley on bass and David Rumley, percussion) had only to play a few chords before hands shot up.

There is no plot. This is a revue depicting those incredible boomer decades through music and history, narrated by “Professor” Jim Chovick, who describes the events that inspired the songs and actions.

The set is simple and effective: a bandstand with rock-concert stanchions and symbols of the time: the peace sign, the VW logo, “Sesame Street,” The Beatles, Woodstock.

Much of the show concentrates on the ’60s, when most boomers came of age. Those were some years: Camelot and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, hula hoops and Haight-Ashbury, dashikis and beads, tie-dye and Hair. And now the depressing and poignant what-happened realization that they’ve gone “from being consumed by passion to passionate consumers” haunted by the agonized question, “When did I become my mother?”

The fine cast boasts one member from the original production: Bill Doyle as Miles, the perpetual hippie. There are a few members of successive shows. But every one of this group is a fine singing actor. My favorites are Doyle and Anise Ritchie, whose voice is exactly right for songs of the era and whose “God Bless the Child” is heartbreaking.

But that’s not to slight Keith Jefferson’s “Heard It Through the Grapevine,” or Marci Anne Wuebben’s terrific voice and acting. Nor Deborah Gilmour Smyth’s “The Rose” or Bryan Feldman’s “Imagine.” They’re all terrific.

Whether or not you’re a boomer, you can’t miss with this show.

Lamb’s Players Theatre’s production of Boomers is now selling tickets through Sept. 28 at its Horton Grand Theatre facility Downtown. Shows Wednesday and Thursday at 7:30 p.m.; Friday and Saturday at 4 and 8 p.m.; and Sunday at 2 p.m. For tickets call 619-437-0600 or visit www.lambsplayers.org

Those Broadway babies who “really need this job” are back in town, jostling for a spot on A Chorus Line. The winner of nine Tonys (plus a special award for longest-running Broadway musical) plays through Aug. 18 at Civic Theatre.

Anyone who’s ever auditioned and/or competed for a job can identify with these dancing gypsies driven by love of what they do to subject themselves to possible humiliation and probable rejection.

This production, directed by Bob Avian, co-choreographer of the original show, sports three dancers from the Broadway casts (the show ran nearly 15 years, from 1975-1990) and several newcomers. All are attractive, fine dancers and singers of the straight-ahead, loud Broadway type which many love but I find difficult to listen to. It didn’t help that the sound level was cranked a bit too high on opening night, obscuring too many lyrics.

And speaking of songs, they’ve sanitized “Tits and Ass” – at least in title – to “Dance: Ten; Looks: Three.” That doesn’t really say it, but at least it seems the lyrics haven’t been changed.

A Chorus Line is all about hope and dreams, backstabbing and doing what it takes to get the job. For my money, there isn’t enough plot to keep me in my seat for two hours, the dancing seems fairly routine, (seeming better than that only because so many people are doing it at once) and the sound system is too loud for my enjoyment level.

But I’m an old lady, and this show has the longest-run record for some reason. So take my opinion for what it’s worth.

A Chorus Line plays through Aug. 17 at Civic Theatre. Shows Friday at 8 p.m.; Saturday at 2 and 8 p.m.; Sunday at 1 and 6 p.m. For tickets call (619) 570-1100 or Ticketmaster at 619-220-TIXS.