The Miracle Worker

Stacia Rice long has been a fixture on local stages, though we became enamored of her last year when she starred in a blockbuster production of Tennessee Williams’ workhorse, A Streetcar Named Desire. Anyone so capable of unlocking the vintage desperation and fragility of Miss Blanche DuBois, American literature’s most famous coquette, deserves special attention and her own gaggle of groupies. So it’s with great interest that we note the founding of Rice’s new company, Torch Theater. Although her choice for an inaugural text–The Miracle Worker, an antiquated, saccharine-sweet 1959 play by William Gibson about Helen Keller and her teacher, Annie Sullivan–might raise an eyebrow, Rice’s performance as Sullivan will no doubt be powerful enough to blow the dust right off any outmoded lines. 711 W. Franklin Ave., Minneapolis; 952-929-9097; www.torchtheater.com