King’sPlayers offers ‘Cinderella’

She’s been portrayed by Julie Andrews, Lesley Ann Warren and Brandy.

She’s been swept off her feet by and won the heart of Jon Cypher, Stuart Damon or Paolo Montalban after an assist from Fairy Godmother Edie Adams, Celeste Holm or Whitney Houston.

Where to see it “Cinderella”: 8 p.m. Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday, 2 and 8 p.m. April 1 and 2 p.m. April 2, Shorecrest Performing Arts Center, 15343 25th Ave. NE, Seattle. $23, $18 senior, at 206-914-2495, www.kingsplayerswa.org. “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat”: Tuesday through April 2, Paramount Theatre, 911 Pine St., Seattle. $20 to $60, at the box office, 206-682-1414, www.theparamount.com or Ticketmaster. “9 Parts of Desire”: Through April 15, Seattle Rep’s Leo K. Theatre, 155 Mercer St., Seattle Center. $10 to $36, box office or www.seattlerep.org. “The Voice of the Prairie”: Today through April 22, Taproot Theatre, 204 N. 85th St., Seattle. $23 to $30, 206-781-9707; www.taproottheatre.org. “Verbatim Verboten”: Midnight Fridays through April at University Theatre, 5510 University Way NE, Seattle. $10. 206-624-4455.

The year was 1957, 1965 or 1997.

The Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II musical retelling of the classic fairy tale “Cinderella” has been produced three different times for television. Now it’s the spring production of King’sPlayers.

Cinderella is a teenage girl forced to do all of the menial tasks in the home she shares with her cold-hearted stepmother and homely stepsisters. One day when home alone, Cinderella shares a cup of water with a thirsty and handsome traveler, not realizing until he continues on his journey that he is the crown prince of the kingdom.

Shortly thereafter, the king and queen invite every young maiden in the kingdom to a royal ball so that the crown prince can find a girl to marry. Cinderella’s stepmother and stepsisters go to the ball, leaving Cinderella behind to wish about how her life could be. While she is daydreaming, she is visited by her fairy godmother, who makes it possible for her wishes to come true.

When “Rogers &Hammerstein’s Cinderella” first aired on March 31, 1957, it was watched by more than 107 million people. It has been a beloved version of the story ever since.

The King’sPlayers production opens Saturday, with five performances through April 2 at the Shorecrest Performing Arts Center in Seattle.

“Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat”: The touring production of “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” opens Tuesday at the Paramount Theatre in Seattle.

The production is a rainbow ride through biblical Egypt on the wings of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s uplifting music and the humor and poetry of lyricist Tim Rice. This irresistible musical about the trials and triumphs of Joseph paints a picture of betrayal and hardship, prophecy and forgiveness.

Patrick Cassidy stars as Joseph, with Amy Adams as the Narrator, in the musical, which runs through April 2.

“9 Parts of Desire”: A hit of the off-Broadway season, “9 Parts of Desire” has opened at the Seattle Repertory Theatre for a run through April 15.

Writer/performer Heather Raffo spent 11 years conducting dozens of interviews on over four continents with Iraqi women. Her resulting “theatrical mosaic” depicts the realities of life in Iraq both under Saddam Hussein and since his ouster for several individual women, whose worlds have been frayed and fractured by their country’s troubled history.

While their stories share a theme of survival against shocking odds, Raffo’s incisive distillation of their experiences shows that both oppression and deliverance come with costs, and their violent realities transcend something as simple as political polemic.

“9 Parts of Desire” stars Najla Said, daughter of political activist Edward Said.

“The Voice of the Prairie”: Taproot Theatre’s 30th anniversary season continues with a presentation of John Olive’s tender romantic comedy “Voice of the Prairie,” opening tonight for a run through April 22.

Unlikely radio celebrity David Quinn captures the heart of the Midwest with his tales of young love and adventure with a blind girl named Frankie. Will the magic of the airwaves re-kindle lost love? Set in the early days of radio, the play is a theatrical journey to a place where anything and everything is possible.

Scott Nolte directs a cast of Taproot favorites Jeff Berryman, Timothy Hornor and Marianne Savell playing over a dozen characters.

“Verbatim Verboten”: The perennial invasion-of-privacy revue created by Michael Martin, has returned to Seattle this month following a short hiatus after a successful fall run in Belltown. The show, which showcases re-enactments of celebrity phone conversations, private e-mails and freak-outs of all kinds, is being reborn as a daring late-night production at Seattle’s historic University Theater, home to Jet City Improv.

A favorite with audiences from New York to Chicago to Minneapolis, “Verbatim Verboten” presents a cast of some of Seattle’s finest comic actors reading word-for-word transcripts of illicitly recorded conversations of the famous, the infamous and the downright ludicrous. Whether it’s a despondent Richard Nixon during the dog days of Watergate, a petulant Britney Spears whining backstage, an irate Spike Lee on a New York Times reporter’s voicemail, or the perfidious Enron inside-traders, “Verbatim Verboten” gleefully exposes all.

The new cast features four Northwest actors reunited from the 2005 production. Charles “Zan” Christensen is a former Chicagoan who’s collaborated with Martin on stage productions for over a decade. Matt Lovell is a writer, actor and director. Also appearing will be Matthew Lyman and Brandon Simmons.

King’sPlayers photo

FAR LEFT: Robin Weakland (left), Sue Stombaugh and Janet Kockritz portray the stepmother and stepsisters in the King’sPlayers’ “Cinderella.”

LEFT: Patrick Cassidy stars in “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” at the Paramount in Seattle.

Erik Stuhaug photo

BELOW: Timothy Hornor and Marianne Savell in “The Voice of the Prairie” at Taproot Theatre.