Most college graduation parties don’t come with a seduction attempt by a married woman.

Poor nebbishy Ben Braddock (Daniel Zisko), hiding in his room from the party his parents are throwing for him downstairs, has just peeled down to his skivvies when the impossibly sexy and sophisticated Mrs. Robinson (Kaly McKenna) walks in, pretending to be looking for the bathroom.

What happens then is the stuff of a young man’s dreams, novelist Charles Webb’s imagination and the talk of the 1967 film year. Is there an adult alive who hasn’t seen The Graduate with Anne Bancroft and Dustin Hoffman, or who hasn’t seen that amazing poster of Ben gazing at Bancroft’s impossibly long and lovely legs? Well, here’s your chance to renew your acquaintance with an old friend, or to find out what the fuss was about.

OnStage Playhouse presents The Graduate through April 7, directed by and co-starring Zisko.

Ben, as confused about his future as most liberal arts graduates, is unimpressed by the one-word solution to his career problem offered by a neighbor: “plastics.” On the other hand, what good would graduate school do?

Then there’s neighbor kid Elaine Robinson (Rhianna Cultrona), now in school at Berkeley, the elder Braddocks’ pick for daughter-in-law and declared off-limits by her mother.

Though the play is somewhat dated both in situations and in a reference to “queers,” which would not be heard today (and was deleted from the film), there’s an innocent and quixotic quality about Ben that makes him fun to watch. Zisko is also blessed with a wonderful Mrs. Robinson in Kaly McKenna. McKenna has just the right calm, in-control attitude to play off Ben’s skittish push/pull demeanor and stammering delivery. And she has great legs.

Kudos to the OnStage cast and crew for taking on this play with multiple scene changes, many involving shoving a bed offstage through a slot and later retrieving it.

Ah, those great college days. Go. Reminisce. Enjoy.

The Graduate plays through April 7 at OnStage Playhouse in Chula Vista. Shows Thursday through Saturday at 8 p.m.; Sunday at 2 p.m. For tickets, call 619-422-7787 or visit http://onstageplayhouse.org.

It’s one of those theatrical phenoms like The Fantasticks. Menopause, the Musical has been running in cities across the country and around the world for the past five years. The current count is 100 cities in eight countries.

The show is in extended run through August 26 at the Lyceum Theatre, directed by Kathryn Conte.

Menopause, the Musical brings together four disparate women and their problems with The Change: tall, slim, suited Power Woman (Anise Ritchie), cute blonde Soap Star (Karen Schooley), unreconstructed hippie Earth Mother (Alex Apostolidis) and reliable old Iowa Housewife (Melinda Gilb). They meet tussling over a black lace bra at Bloomingdale’s and spend the next 90 minutes singing Jeanie Linders’ menopausal lyrics to boomer standards from the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s.

It’s a cute idea – after all, women do enter a particularly revolting era after 40 with unpleasant symptoms (night sweats, hot flashes, mood swings, food binges, memory loss, wrinkles) that annoy more than just we women. The idea of sisterhood reminding you that you’re not as crazy as you’re acting is downright comforting.

The problem is that the show isn’t that good. It gets better as it goes along, but really drags through at least the first third (especially the performance I saw, where the mikes cut in and out). Unimaginative lines like “I used to be captain of the cheerleaders. Now I’m like the captain of the Titanic. What a sinking feeling!” and song lyrics like “I heard it through the grapevine/you no longer will see 39” don’t help. And if that’s not bad enough, these talented ladies have to contend with dismally amateurish choreography.

On the upside, there’s Schooley singing “I’m havin’ a hot flash (“Heat Wave”), and the menopausal version of “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” is a stitch (“In the guest room or on the sofa my husband sleeps tonight.”). And the new “My Girl” lyrics (“If you want to know where the fat grams go, they’re on my hips”) doubtless speak to more than a few of us.

Gilb shines in a scene about a black lace teddy and has an amusing relationship with an adult toy (think “Good Vibrations”). And Ritchie’s Tina Turner impression is a hoot.

But this show is more Cleaver than clever, more sitcom than satire. The ladies in my audience seemed enthralled, but to me it’s a puzzlement that Menopause, the Musical has caught on the way it has.

Menopause, the Musical plays through August 26 at the Lyceum Theatre. Shows Thursday through Saturday at 7:30 p.m.; matinees Wednesday and Thursday at 2 p.m., and Saturday and Sunday at 3 p.m. For tickets, call 619-544-1000 or visit www.sandiegorep.com.

Remember singing about that Christmas ride over the river and through the woods to Grandmother’s house? Playwright Paula Vogel gives it an imaginative reinterpretation in The Long Christmas Ride Home: A Puppet Play with Actors at Diversionary Theatre through April 15. Lisa Berger directs.

But this isn’t your ideal family, nor a ho-ho-ho trip in the trusty, rusty Rambler for any of them. The father (called here Man and played by John Rosen) has apparently unsubtly worked his way sexually through most of the wives at church and is currently enamored of the unseen Sheila. His wife, the dissatisfied Woman (Dana Hooley), dreams of the extra-curricular relationship she has not as yet sought. A “lapsed Catholic and an assimilated Jew,” they represent a none-too-successful intermarriage – defined by Man as “the mingling by blood of two cultures at war.”

The children are all Bunraku puppets. Oldest daughter Rebecca fantasizes about the cute boys at school. So does son Stephen, fascinated by things Japanese and about to get carsick. Only youngest daughter Claire anticipates Christmas at Grandma’s with positive anticipation.

As might be expected, the visit does not go well, ending in a fight, angry words and the demand that the family leave.

The Long Christmas Ride Home is an odd but intriguing hybrid of a holiday memory play, combining East and West, Noh theater and Bunraku puppetry, including dance, shadow work and a musician playing an assortment of unusual instruments. There’s a lot of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town approach in the narration as well.

The story of the ride is the best part of the show. Funny, poignant and familiar, it conjures up similar memories. An extended bit about a church service (they worship at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Rock Springs), with its guest speaker’s long illustrated talk about Japanese art, wears out its welcome early, while a manger scene with a toy Jesus moving his arm and leg is captivating.

After the Christmas trip, the play lurches forward to the children’s early adulthood. Not surprisingly, they have the same relationship problems they saw at home. Worse, Stephen comes down with AIDS (likely inspired by Vogel’s own brother), and the script gets increasingly dreary from there.

Still, The Long Christmas Ride Home gets points for originality of presentation and for a fine opening scene. It’s an odd play, not entirely successful, but certainly worth a look.

The Long Christmas Ride Home: A Puppet Play with Actors plays through April 15 at Diversionary Theatre. Shows Thursday at 7:30, Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m.; Sunday at 2 and 7 p.m.; Monday, April 2 at 7:30. For tickets, call 619-220-0097 or visit www.diversionary.org.