A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder, Porchlight Music Theatre at the Ruth Page Auditorium, through March 16. A score that hearkens to Gilded-Age whimsy, scenery like a Victorian greeting card designed by Monty Python and costumes scrumptious enough to eat for dessert enhance the delight of this frothy winter treat. MSB
Nina Simone: Four Women, Northlight Theatre at the North Shore Center for the Performing Arts in Skokie, through March 2. The activist anthems of Nina Simone, as sung by the outstanding vocalists assembled for Christiana Ham’s biomusical, have lost none of their righteous anger or rousing elation. MSB
—By Mary Shen Barnidge