An old classic gets a wildly inventive interpretation at La Jolla Playhouse through Nov. 13, as Minneapolis’ Theatre de la Jeune Lune presents its version of Molière’s The Miser. Dominique Serrand directs.

The Miser, Molière’s satire of avarice, parents, children and class distinctions, makes its points with extreme examples, the most excessive being the title character. Harpagon (Steven Epp) is an old and very rich man who lives in a crumbling manse with loose floorboards (it costs money to fix things), ratty curtains and practically no furniture. Even his dressing gown is tattered.

Harpagon has a daughter, Élise (Sarah Agnew), whom he is eager to marry off. He’s found a suitable husband in the wealthy Anselme (Robert Sonkowsky), who has agreed to take Élise off his hands without a dowry. But Élise has other ideas – she’s in love with the financially most unsuitable servant Valère (Jim Lichtscheidl).

Likewise, Harpagon’s son, Cléante (Stephen Cartmell), also of marriageable age, is in love with Mariane (Natalie Moore), a poor girl who lives with her widowed mother.

Everything is a little off in this production, including set decoration and many of the costumes – off-white, tired looking, and in need of a massive infusion of life, light and color, not to mention money. Even Harpagon’s servants look like refugees from the asylum at Charenton.

This is the most physical interpretation and the earthiest translation of this play you are likely to see. It’s a combination of vaudeville, mime and acrobatics (with a hefty injection of just plain lunacy) that has characters climbing a ladder attached to one wall, balancing on that loose floorboard, and showering with a system unlike any you’ve seen.

Epp is spectacular as Harpagon. He’s got the moves, the attitude and the look. And he’s damned funny in his outrageous greed.

The children and lovers are equally excellent, as are the smaller but juicy parts of Jacques the chef/footman (Remo Airaldi), Frosine the matchmaker (Barbara Kingsley), head servant La Flèche (Nathan Keepers) and Sonkowsky’s Anselme.

For all the craziness and farce, this is a dark play. Harpagon’s irrational fear that everyone is out to steal his money is not mitigated by the happy ending for the other characters, and he remains alone with his money.

This is not the dusty old classic you may think it is. It’s a brilliant production, easily one of the best the Playhouse has ever presented. Don’t miss it.

The Miser plays through Nov. 13 at La Jolla Playhouse’s Mandell Weiss Theatre. Shows Tuesday through Saturday at 8:00 p.m.; Sunday at 7:00 p.m.; matinees Saturday and Sunday at 2:00 p.m. For tickets, call (858) 550-1010 or visit www.lajollaplayhouse.com.

In case you didn’t get the word: No, Antonio Salieri didn’t poison Mozart, despite his anguished near-deathbed “confession” in Amadeus. But you must admit it’s a deliciously theatrical idea, and Peter Shaffer created a terrific drama from just that speculation.

It’s been a long time (1984, in fact) since audiences were introduced to the contradictions of the child prodigy-turned-childlike musical genius on film. The time is ripe, and La Jolla Stage Company now brings Shaffer’s 1979 play to the local stage.

Director James P. Dublino has chosen the perfect venue: The Regency Room of the oh-so-elegant Westgate Hotel downtown. The ornate halls and splendid chandeliers make set design essentially unnecessary, and inspire visions of the great palaces of Europe.

Shaffer’s Salieri (Barry Hathaway) is an old man – near death, in fact – who both narrates and participates in the telling of his story. Salieri was one of the most celebrated musicians of his day, the court musician of Emperor Joseph II of Austria and a composer of many operas. All he ever wanted to do, he says, was praise God through music.

But Salieri was a gentleman and a journeyman musician, and when the upstart Mozart (Brian Evans) shows up with his apparently effortless genius (and an appalling taste for scatological humor), Salieri feels a failure; the resulting jealousy leading the older man to put a few fictional roadblocks in the way of the new young star.

But never mind all that. Bask in the ambience and enjoy Shaffer’s delightful script, the gorgeous costumes and the lovely voice of April Fisher as Salieri’s pupil Katherina. Giggle at the closed-mindedness of court opera conductor Count Orsini-Rosenberg (Terence Burke); enjoy the adorable gossipmongers Venticelli 1 and 2 (Kelsey Jones and Molly Lahr), and be reminded that genius sometimes comes in unlikely packages.

No matter that the Regency Room isn’t really big enough for the voices of either Fisher or Hathaway. The actors are having a wonderful time, and you will too.

Amadeus plays through Nov. 6 at the Westgate Hotel. Shows Friday and Saturday at 8:00 p.m.; matinees Saturday and Sunday at 2:00 p.m. For tickets, call (858) 454-7798 or visit www.thelajollastageco.org.

The Vietnam War is still a scar on the hearts and minds of Americans who lived through the era, and should serve forever as a caution to government officials who contemplate incursions into foreign lands.

Thousands of American men (and many more thousands of Vietnamese) were lost or wounded in that war, but the many women who also served have been largely forgotten.

Mo’olelo Performing Arts company takes a step toward setting that right with A Piece of My Heart, telling the stories of six women who served in Vietnam. Based on interviews recorded in Keith Walker’s book of the same title, playwright Shirley Lauro follows the women from the idealism of enlistment through the hell of the war, and into the 20-year period after their return home.

The characters include: Martha (Erika Beth Phillips), a Navy nurse; Maryjo (Nicole Gabriella Scipione), singer and guitarist in a rock band; Army nurses Sissy (Siobhan Sullivan) and Leeann (Seema Sueko); Red Cross volunteer Whitney (Natalie Salins); and Steele (Valerie J. Ludwig), an Army intelligence officer. Lance Arthur Smith plays a variety of American men.

It’s heartbreaking enough to watch their transition from fresh-faced do-gooders to exhausted war veterans, but nearly unbearable to witness their lives after ’Nam. All suffer some form of post-traumatic stress, accompanied variously by alcoholism, suicidal thoughts, nightmares and anger.

A Piece of My Heart is a moving piece and a fine ensemble effort, effectively staged and well directed by Siobhan Sullivan. Mo’olelo is providing performances for local students as a teaching aid, in partnership with the Veterans Museum and Memorial Center in Balboa Park (where the play is presented) and Young Audiences of San Diego.

This is an important piece of U.S. history well worth seeing.

A Piece of My Heart plays through Nov. 6 at the Veterans Museum and Memorial Center (on the corner of Park Boulevard and Presidents Way) in Balboa Park. Shows Friday and Saturday, Nov. 4-5, at 8:00 p.m.; matinee Sunday, Nov. 6, at 2:00 p.m. For tickets, call (619) 342-7395 or e-mail tickets@moolelo.net. Bad Dates

Haley Walker (DiAnna Driscoll) loves shoes. No, I mean she loves shoes. They line her bedroom walls, where she hauls them out box by box, tenderly fingering and speaking lovingly of them as she prepares for a series of Bad Dates.

Here’s the backstory: Haley married a bad date back in Texas and had daughter, Vera, then divorced her husband, packed up Vera (and those shoes) and moved to New York City, where she got a job as a waitress.

Haley becomes manager of the restaurant due to business problems of the owners and because, “I’m some sort of a weird restaurant idiot savant,” and now she’s starting to think it’s time for a social life. In Bad Dates, we hear of her mostly unpleasant but often humorous adventures in the dating game, usually while she’s dragging clothes out of the closet and pulling those shoeboxes off the shelves.

Playwright Theresa Rebeck knows whereof she speaks, and women will identify with her experiences immediately. There’s Bug Guy, whom she meets at a Tibetan Buddhist benefit. (A friend dragged her there.) Bug Guy spends an enormous amount of time worrying about butter in his food and cholesterol’s effect on his colon.

Haley’s mother gets into the act, setting her daughter up with a professional from San Antonio (“Texan, but in a good way”) who teaches law at Columbia. A perfect match, right? Except that mom apparently didn’t notice the guy is gay.

The third date has Haley all a-twitter with the “magic” of it all… for a while, anyway.

Driscoll’s Haley is adorable – young enough to be hopeful, old enough not to be too surprised by her experiences, and willing, by the end of the evening, to look below the surface of the diamond in the rough.

Bad Dates may be likened to a female version of The Male Intellect – an Oxymoron? which played for months in Old Town. And that’s a good thing.

Bad Dates plays through Nov. 13 at San Diego Repertory Theatre. Shows Wednesday through Saturday at 8:00 p.m.; Tuesday and Sunday at 7:00 p.m.; matinees Saturday and Sunday at 2:00 p.m. For tickets, call (619) 544-1000 or visit www.sandiegorep.com.