Philadelphia Weekly

If you're looking for a bit of smart holiday fun, look no further than the Lantern Theater Company's production of Moliere's ageless satire The School for Wives.

The play focuses on pompous bachelor Arnolphe (Greg Wood). Obsessed with finding a faithful wife, he sets his sights on Agnes (Joanna Liao), a young girl whose purity and innocence Arnolphe believes will ensure her devotion. But while Agnes isn't as practiced in the art of deception as Arnolphe, she's no fool.

Director Kathryn Nocero MacMillan starts slowly and builds momentum. The result is a languid opening 30 minutes. But when the lovestruck suitor Horace (Luigi Sottile) arrives to threaten Arnolphe's wedding plans, MacMillan's production finds its footing.

Performed in and around Nick Embree's colorfully playful set (which depicts Arnolphe's home as a bizarre dollhouse), MacMillan's deliberate pacing allows the five cast members to ease into their roles, resulting in a host of impressive performances.

One of the area's finest veteran actors, Greg Wood built his reputation playing charismatic leading men. His character Arnolphe is quite the opposite. A pompous old man accustomed to having his way, Arnolphe views women as possessions. Wood's Arnolphe is conceited and misogynistic but too ridiculous to despise. He's more pitiful than vile.

Wood's witty, amiable portrayal drives the production, but Liao's Agnes provides the sparkle. The antithesis of the Machiavellian Arnolphe, Agnes is endearingly naive. Arnolphe equates Agnes' innocence with ignorance, but when she recites his maxims of marriage (which among other inequities proclaims the husband as lord and master of the wife), the young woman is acutely aware that on Arnolphe's terms marriage is more a prison sentence than an equitable union.

Liao captures Agnes' outrage beautifully, and her artful performance is the perfect foil to Wood's blustering Arnolphe.

Featuring spectacular costumes by Millie Hiibel (the ostentatious shoes favored by the men make Imelda Marcos' collection look positively tasteful) and a hugely funny performance by Lee Ann Etzold as the housekeeper Georgette, the production is perfectly in step with Maya Slater's jaunty, fun-filled translation.

Even-handed and surprisingly insightful, MacMillan mocks not only Arnolphe's antiquated attitudes toward women (which are easily dismissed by a contemporary audience as relics from a less-progressive age) but our own absurd hypocrisies as well.

We may laugh at Arnolphe's duplicity, but in the end it's Agnes' sincerity we celebrate.

The School for Wives
Through Dec. 9. $15-$35. St. Stephen's Theater, 10th and Ludlow sts. 215.829.0395. www.lanterntheater.org

The Flashpoint Theatre Company adds to its impressive resume with an accomplished production of Bridget Carpenter's involving but ultimately flawed black comedy The Faculty Room. Set at suburban Madison Feury High, Carpenter imagines high school as only slightly less dangerous than Iraq. Weapons are confiscated on a daily basis and the teachers seek refuge in the faculty lounge, a sort of green zone that provides a safe haven from the mayhem of the hallways. It's not an especially novel scenario, and Carpenter's plot is often overblown and wearisome. However it's impossible not to be fascinated by the school's collection of war-weary educators. Teaching at their alma mater, Adam (Mark Cairns, in a transfixing performance) and Zoe (the talented Janice Rowland) empathize with their students (they also date them) but remain stuck in time. Both yearn for a life beyond the school's walls, but are too emotionally immature and ill-equipped for the adult world. Unlike the entrenched Adam and Zoe, new teacher Carver (Keith Conallen) is an outsider. A gay man with a mysterious past, he treats his students with detached professionalism. Director Meghann Williams' production keeps us intrigued right up to the play's final scene when The Faculty Room implodes in an absurd conclusion featuring biblical prophecies and a book club that works itself into an apocalyptic frenzy. (J.C.R.) >> Through Dec. 1. $15-$18. Second Stage at the Adrienne, 2030 Sansom St. 215.922.4462. www.theatreexile.org