See It

It has been years now since Kansas City audiences were treated to the wise, absorbing dramas of Missouri-born, world-renowned playwright Lanford Wilson. That makes an event of tonight’s opening of Burn This, Wilson’s feisty 1988 show pitting a ranting, cokeheaded homophobe named Pale against a loft full of New York creative types. His rough-and-tumble romance with Anna, a choreographer who should know better, drives a play that is soaked through with Wilson’s brand of well-observed disillusionment. Directed by Gregory Chafin — who last year helmed a well-received Trainspotting — and presented at the Next Space (512 East 18th Street, 816-863-4101) by the Journeyman Theatre Company, Burn This has every chance of turning out to be urgent theater.

Mondays, Fridays, Saturdays, 7 p.m. Starts: April 17. Continues through May 4, 2009