A Play About a Mass Shooting Survivor, Brand-New Works by Latino and Latino Playwrights and 3 Other Must-See Theater Events This Fall

The Events

If this year in Portland theater is trending toward ambiguous moral and emotional trials, Third Rail Repertory Theatre was ahead of the curve. Its last season was full of intense, answerless plays produced with lucid existentialism. The Events sounds as if it will add to that streak. The 2013 play follows Claire, the survivor of a mass shooting at a community choir practice, as she attempts to process what she experienced. The nonlinear plot calls for only one other actor than Claire (who plays both her shooter and her therapist) and a community choir that looms on the edge of the stage like a Greek chorus. Imago Theatre, 17 SE 8th Ave., thirdrailrep.org. 7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday, 2 pm Sunday, Oct. 27-Nov. 18. $25-$45.

Ingenio Festival

Last season, bilingual theater Milagro had an ambitious roster of new premieres, including a joyous Spanish language musical version of The Tempest and a time-traveling tribute to Portland-raised humanitarian Ben Linder. Now, it's expanding its support of original theater by launching a program to support new works by Latina and Latino playwrights. Four of those works will debut as staged readings this fall. In January, there'll be seven more plays. Milagro Theatre, 525 SE Stark St., milagro.org. 7:30 pm Friday-Saturday, 2 pm Sunday-Saturday, Sept. 8-10. Free.

Chang(e)

Along with Suzi Takahashi, Beaverton native Soomi Kim has created a trilogy of plays about Asian Americans who influenced history before their lives were cut short. The pair's show that Boom Arts will produce is dedicated to Kathy Change. As a writer and performance artist, Change (née Chang) advocated for the likes of legal marijuana and anti-violence. At the age of 46, she ended her life by self immolation. Takahashi and Kim tell Change's story with a kaleidoscopic set design and costumes. Headwaters Theatre, 55 NE Farragut St., boomarts.org. 7:30 pm Thursday-Sunday, Dec. 7-10. $12-$50.

The Caucasian Chalk Circle

You never know what exactly you're going to get with a Shaking the Tree production. In the hands of artistic director Samantha Van Der Merwe, even seemingly straightforward scripts can become dreamlike. So it seems fitting the company is opening its season with a play as bizarre as Bertolt Brecht's sprawling, modernist play The Caucasian Chalk Circle. In the 1948 play, multiple storylines and a play within a play form around a peasant woman who finds an abandoned baby. Shaking The Tree, 823 SE Grant St., shaking-the-tree.com. 7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday, 2 pm Sunday, Oct. 6-Nov. 4. $10-$30.

Water by the Spoonful and The Happiest Song Plays Last

Profile Theatre's season of Quiara Alegría Hudes' plays ends with a rotating repertoire of two plays from her Elliot Trilogy, which follows the life of a 19-year-old Puerto Rican American veteran named Elliot Ruiz. Profile staged the first play in the Elliot series, Elliot, A Soldier's Fugue, back in February. Like every other play so far in Profile's Hudes season, it was deeply touching and poetic. So it seems safe to assume the last two plays will be too. Artists Repertory Theatre, 1515 SW Morrison St., profiletheater.com. 7:30 pm Wednesday-Saturday, 3 pm Sunday, Nov. 1-19. $20-$36.