Olney Theatre

Dancers alone The lowdown -- The Art of the Solo, a compilation of modern dance solos by famous 20th-century choreographers, returns to the Baltimore Museum of Art on Saturday. The program features the revival premiere of Jose Limon's "Two Preludes," Isadora Duncan's "Dances to Chopin" and Murray Louis' "Frail Demons." Artists include Elizabeth Lowe Ahearn, Jayne Bernasconi, Jeanne Bresciani and Kim Gibilisco. If you go -- The show starts at 7 p.m. Saturday at 10 Art Museum Drive. Tickets are $25-$50.

Bill and Willy -- brothers under the skin? There are unsettling similarities between the 42nd president of the United States and former West German Chancellor Willy Brandt -- at least as the latter is portrayed in a thought-provoking, if flawed, production of Democracy at the Olney Theatre Center. If you go Democracy runs through Aug. 12 at the Olney Theatre Center, 2001 Olney-Sandy Spring Road, Olney. Call 301-924-3400.

Jim Petosa, who shepherded a troupe of actors from a summer theater to a regional company with a $5.2 million budget, has announced that he will step down as artistic director of the Olney Theatre Center. But he's not leaving until December 2008 and, even then, will remain on the board of directors. For years, Petosa has divided his responsibilities between Olney and Boston University, where he heads the theater program. "My life in Boston has been getting more and more complicated," Petosa said yesterday.

"All this is in Baltimore," the recorded voice of the late Eubie Blake proclaims in Olney Theatre Center's Eubie! Excerpted from a vintage interview with the Baltimore-born ragtime composer and performer, the line is one of the production's many pieces of historical documentation - including projected photos and sheet music, as well as a lobby exhibit featuring the figure of Blake, seated at a piano, from Baltimore's National Great Blacks in Wax Museum....

In the grand tradition of George Bernard Shaw and Henrik Ibsen, W. Somerset Maugham was a proto-feminist playwright. Seeing Olney Theatre Center's gleaming revival of Maugham's The Constant Wife, it's clear that, like Shaw and Ibsen, Maugham believed that if women could attain economic freedom, then all sorts of other freedoms -- sexual, political, etc. -- would follow.

Some people have clouds hanging over their heads. The characters in Irene Wurtzel's In the Mood have a sculpture hanging over theirs. It's a huge, abstract, pointed sculpture that is being carved by an artist named Jennifer Workman at the start of the play. But it is menacingly suspended-like a giant dagger - above the actors' heads throughout most of director Jim Petosa's production at Olney Theatre Center. The sculpture is only a metaphorical threat. The real threat is posed by Jennifer's husband, Neil, who is an undersecretary of state and suffers from what appears to be life-threatening bipolar disorder.

NEIL YOUNG CONCERT He's been to Hollywood, he's been to Redwood. For more than 40 years, singer / songwriter Neil Young has been performing to legions of fans and inspiring musicians around the globe. And Wednesday, his music will be celebrated at a tribute concert at Strathmore in Bethesda. More than 30 local musicians will perform at the outdoor concert "Tribute to Neil Young." The Yayhoos, Mary Ann Redmond, Jon Carroll, Deeme Katson, Tommy Lepson, Martha Hull, Tom Lofgren, Cravin' Dogs, Ronnie Newmyer and many others are scheduled to play the Canadian songwriter's introspective tunes.

Stories, puppets -- Transformations Theatre Troupe of Boston (above), a new group of young women recently graduated from Boston University, will present an original musical play, Pearls From Salt, at Olney Theatre Center, 2001 Olney-Sandy Spring Road, Olney. The piece, for older children and adults, tells complex folk tales about the lives of young girls, using masks and puppets. Pearls From Salt will be presented on the Root Family Stage at Will's Place (at the Olney Theatre Center) at 6 p.m. today, Thursday and Aug. 18; 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. tomorrow and Aug. 19; and 2 p.m. Sunday and Aug. 20. Admission is free.

EXHIBIT WALTERS' PRECIOUS BOOKS It's an odd name for an unusual exhibit. Schatzkammer: Henry Walters' German Manuscripts, an exhibit of 24 medieval German manuscripts, is on display Saturday through Oct. 29 at the Walters Art Museum. Henry Walters amassed the collection of high-quality, rare and illustrated ninth-through-16th-century Gospel books, prayer books, liturgical manuscripts and theological texts throughout his lifetime. During the Middle Ages, precious books and possessions such as these were stored in the Schatzkammer, or treasury, of a church or palace for protection.