With today’s side deal, $29 gets you a four-show flex pass to Stageworks Theatre (a $79 value). The flex pass uses a punch-card format to allow any combination of people to see any combination of shows in the 2010–11 season—for example, one person can attend all four shows, or four people can attend one show.

In the darkened arena of the local, nonprofit theater, audience members communicate with the drama on stage as though the actors’ lit faces were more real than the insistent nudging from a neighbor vying for armrest dominance. This season includes such offerings as: The God of Isaac (December 2–19), which portrays a young man’s quest to discover his spiritual identity; The MOMologues (February 17–26), a comedic exploration of the job of motherhood using irreverent wit; and A Lesson Before Dying (April), which engages an innocent black man’s search for honor and dignity before he is put to death for a crime he did not commit. The final play in July has yet to be announced.

Reviews

The Tampa Bay Business Journal named Stageworks Theatre its Arts, Culture and Humanities Nonprofit of the Year in 2009, and Creative Loafing awarded Stageworks' Artistic Director Anna Brennen "Best of the Bay" awards in 2009 and 2010. Brennen was also named the Mayor's Artist of the Year in 2006. Creative Loafing and the St. Petersburg Times reviewed past performances from Stageworks Theatre. More than 675 Facebookers are fans.

• This is theater-as-experience, beyond paraphrase, beyond intellect, emotional, intuitive and strangely resonant. The whole thing lingers in the mind like an unfamiliar but affecting melody. – Mark E. Leib, Creative Loafing