Michael Starzynski and Joyce Stilson in Alleyway Theatre's "The Book of Liz."

It’s a furious finish to the theater season as numerous productions open this weekend and next. These will be the final shows of the season to be considered for the Artie Awards, Buffalo’s theater awards, which will be held on Monday, May 22, at the Town Ballroom.

Until then, however, there is an abundance of theater to see.

This weekend:

The Book of Liz, a comedy by Amy Sedaris and David Sedaris, opens at the Alleyway Theatre, starring Joyce Stilson. In the play, Sister Elizabeth feels underappreciated in the religious community where she lives and ventures out into the world. She is sorely missed, however, when the cheese recipe just doesn’t taste the same anymore…Stilson has, over the years, made a specialty of edgy comic characters; Morticians in Love comes to mind especially vividly. The Book of Liz gives her ample opportunity to play to her comic strengths in a role created by Amy Sedaris.

Desperate Measures, a musical by Peter Kellogg and David Friedman based on Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure, is presented by O’Connell & Company at The Cabaret in the Square Theatre in Snyder. Set in the American West, Desperate Measures is populated with the obligatory roster of characters: cowboys, a nun, a priest, a sleazy politician and the inevitable saloon girl. The show promises to match O’Connell & Company’s production of the Gilligan’s Island musical for emotional depth, dramatic complexity and insight into contemporary issues.

5 Guys Named Moe, the musical revue by Clarke Peters, featuring the music of Louis Jordan, opens this week at Studio Arena Theatre. The show was last seen when Buffalo’s African American Cultural Center’s Paul Robeson Theatre staged a first-rate production at the Pfeifer Theatre. The crowd-pleasing revue marks the conclusion of the Studio Arena season. After this, the era of Kathleen Gaffney, the new artistic director, begins!

Loot, Joe Orton’s irreverent comedy about a pair of burglars who hide the swag in an occupied coffin, opens at the Irish Classical Theatre’s Andrews Theatre. A perfect example of Orton’s signature worldview—total lunacy presented through a lens of mundane realism—Loot is one of the playwright’s most accessible plays. Those who know Orton (and the Andrews Theatre) are curious to see how the piece, directed by Robert Knopf, will work on an arena stage.

Organic Movement of the Chair and Pitcher is a new play by local playwright Tim Mcpeek. Directed by Robert Waterhouse, the play is being performed at the New Phoenix Theatre on the Park.

Urinetown: The Musical, a playful spoof of Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht musicals with book and lyrics by Greg Kotis, music and lyrics by Mark Hollman. The MusicalFare production is directed by Randall Kramer and tells the story of a town where you have to pay to go the bathroom, and those who violate the law are banished to…“Urinetown”! Riotously funny in its hugely acclaimed New York outing, MusicalFare has generated an enthusiastic buzz about this show.

Next weekend brings two long-awaited Buffalo premieres of Doug Wright plays, I Am My Own Wife and Quills:

I Am My Own Wife was the surprise Broadway hit of 2004, winning Tony Awards for its script and for its star, Jefferson Mays. From the start, Buffalonians knew that local actor Jimmy Janowski was born to play the solo role, and now, courtesy to his home company, Buffalo United Artists, he will. I Am My Own Wife tells the story of playwright Doug Wright’s fascination with the life of Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, an East German transvestite who survives both the Nazi regime and Soviet-dominated Communist rule. Chris Kelly directs.

Quills is a comedy that pits the Marquis de Sade against the Abbe de Coulmier, one of his jailers at the insane asylum of Charenton. Universally praised for its outrageous theatricality, the play was originally staged by Buffalonian Howard Shalwitz, first in New York and subsequently at his own theater in Washington. The Buffalo premiere is presented by Torn Space Theater at the Adam Mickiewicz Dramatic Circle, directed by Chris Standart.

In town:

Movin’ Out, touring production of the Broadway musical conceived by Twyla Tharp with the music of Billy Joel, comes to Shea’s. Big dance show with familiar music. The tour, reportedly, lives up to the Broadway original in every way.