The autumn readings are always fun, featuring some of the best local talent and taking advantage of performing spaces all over town.

This year's series begins at 7 p.m. Monday at Playhouse in the Park with Dreampuffs of War, a "disturbing comedy about a woman, a war, her landlord and her cat," says WTI producer Kristin Dietsche. Mary Tensing directs.

Upcoming:

• Oct. 25 - Fur, by Migdalia Cruz, re-imagines Beauty and the Beast and centers on a hirsute woman (Regina Pugh) discovered in a circus sideshow. Columbia Performance Center, 3900 Eastern Ave., Columbia Tusculum.

• Nov. 9 - Women at Four O'Clock by Dawn Powell is a timely satire from the 1930s, directed by Cincinnati Shakespeare Festival's Rebecca Bowman at the Main Branch of the Public Library of Cincinnati & Hamilton County.

• Nov. 15 - Necessary Targets by Eve Ensler (famous for Vagina Monologues) focuses on the lives of women in Afghanistan and Iraq. Otto Budig Theater, Student Center, Northern Kentucky University, Highland Heights.

All readings are at 7 p.m. Suggested donation $5. For more information call the initiative at (513) 604-8545.

Glitter and be gray

The Eyes Are the First Thing to Go: The Mid-Life Musical Comedy by CCM grads and Broadway vets Jim and Bob Walton and featuring our own Broadway babe Pam Myers wraps a brief New York run today.

The revue is getting its first public performances as part of the New York Musical Theatre Festival. Director Mark Waldrop is also a CCM grad.

Bob Walton crows that the revue has been a big success in its initial New York run. "We have some nice interest from various producers, investors and regional theaters around the country," so it looks like there's an immediate future for Mid-Life.

While there are "no definitive" plans, the Waltons think they're on to something by zeroing in on baby boomers who are aging daily. "Our hope is that we can get an off-Broadway production of it soon, and then get it out to the rest of the country."

Short run at Aronoff

A Stoop on Orchard Street has been quietly playing off-Broadway since July 2003 .A musical about life in New York's Lower East Side circa 1910, it's a self-produced success story, so much so that author Jay Kholos and his family are cobbling together a tour that starts with three performances next weekend in the Aronoff's Jarson-Kaplan Theater.

At least part of the reason that the tour is setting out from Cincinnati is that Stoop is a real family affair - written by Kholos and produced by Kholos and wife Paula, whose father Red Solomon, 92, was born in the West End, graduated from Hughes High School and spent his career here as a furniture manufacturer.

Non-Equity Stoop follows the struggles and successes of the Lomansky family as they adjust to a new life in American after leaving Eastern Europe. It was inspired by a visit to the Lower East Side Tenement Museum.

According to Playbill Online, the family-run Orchard Street Productions succeeds in marketing to a Jewish audience hungry for stories about their community. The Sunday matinee has sold out and a Saturday evening performance has been added.

Tickets, $39 to $49, are available to 8 p.m. Saturday and 7 p.m. Sunday performances. For reservations and information call the Aronoff box office (513) 621-2787. or visit www.cincinnatiarts.org.

Writing symposium

You can write a musical, too! A good way to get inspired is to sign up for Under Construction 2, a daylong symposium at the Human Race Theatre in Dayton on Oct. 16.

Among the highlights:

Barry Kleinbort and Joseph Thalken start things off at 10 a.m. discussing the process of creation for world premiere WAS, inspired by The Wizard of Oz and opening at Human Race on Oct. 14.

At 1:30 p.m., Tom Jones, co-creator of legendary shows including The Fantasticks and I Do! I Do! will join Thalken to talk about developing the new musical Harold and Maude, and about its upcoming world premiere. A musical sneak preview will be part of the session.

Cost for the workshops is $15. Add the 8 p.m. performance of WAS for $35 (adults) and $20 (students). For reservations and information on workshops and show call Human Race at (937) 461-3823, Ext. 3115.

'Othello' adaptation

If you've been wondering what's next for playwright (and sometimes Enquirer theater reviewer) Joseph McDonough, work-in-progress Stone My Heart will surface Thursday as part of the Ohio Shakespeare Conference, this year hosted at the University of Cincinnati.

Stone My Heart is a contemporary adaptation of Othello, jazzy and urban and set in a Chicago morgue. Last week the drama had a table reading at Playhouse in the Park, which debuted his One last year.

McDonough will discuss the play at 6 p.m. Thursday accompanied by short selections read by CCM drama students. The conference will also feature award-winning playwright Gordon Dahlquist at 10:30 a.m. Saturday when he'll lecture on the Elizabethan masque as a practical model for contemporary political theater. (This is an academic conference.)

Both events are free and open to the public, sponsored by the Helen Weinberger Center for and both will be presented at the Kingsgate Hotel and Conference Center on the UC campus.

For information contact Center director Jon Kamholtz at (513) 556-3906 or kamholj@email.uc.edu.

E-mail jdemaline@enquirer.com