These are the 16 can't-miss shows in Dallas-Fort Worth theater for October

There's no shortage of shows this month, both creepy and not. In order of start date, here are 16 local shows to watch this month

Tallgrass Gothic
Pizza Chapel Theatre Company, October 6-16
Laura's need to leave her rural home and controlling husband is ignited when love offers her escape and a future. Hunger for a new beginning sets off a chain of events that leads to a profound understanding of her true nature and the place where her history and its ghosts populate the landscape. Expect nontraditional staging techniques and storytelling methods to create an original theater piece that blends the familiar and strange in a manner that's both immersive and DIY.

King Lear
Auriga Productions, October 7-22
The inaugural production for this new company is William Shakespeare's epic opus, set in early Christian Britain. Lear’s decision to divide his kingdom among his three daughters ignites a firestorm of greed and betrayal. Displaced as king and cast out as patriarch, Lear discovers the fragility of familial bonds as he descends into madness.

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
Hip Pocket Theatre, October 7-30
This spooky romp through an American fable is told with song and dance. Does Ichabod Crane know what he's getting into there in Sleepy Hollow? Do you?

Plenty of Time
Jubilee Theatre, October 7-30
It is 1968. Corey and Christina meet in Oak Bluffs, a black section of Martha’s Vineyard. Christina is 17 years old and from an upper-class family. Corey is 22 and a member of the Black Panther Party. They share a passionate night together, but the next morning they begin to talk their conflicting worlds unfold. Over the next 33 years they marry — although not to each other — and continue to meet on the same annual date to continue their sometimes illicit affair. Each time they return to the small private beach house, they bring their personal growth and experiences, as well as the influences of the ongoing (sometimes radical, sometimes stagnant) social and political changes for African-Americans.

Junie B.'s Essential Survival Guide to School
Dallas Children's Theater, October 8-30
Junie B. Jones is back, and she’s got some advice to give … eventually. It was her brilliant idea to put together a survival guide for next year’s students, but now she’s at a total loss for what to add to it. It doesn’t help that all her friends are full of cool ideas and dance numbers. How’s a girl supposed to deal with all this competition? Hilariously, of course!

The Hollow
Amphibian Stage, October 12-November 6
This world premiere is based upon the stories of Washington Irving, adapted by playwright John Rapson. The Black Box theater is transformed into Irving's eerie world, bringing the lore to life through ghostly stories and astonishing magical elements that underscore the 90-minute theatrical experience.

C.S. Lewis On Stage: Further Up & Further In
Fellowship for Performing Arts, October 13-23
From the producers of The Screwtape Letters comes a new theatrical experience that takes audiences further up and further into the spiritual journey of C.S. Lewis. Using Lewis’ own words within a vividly immersive, multimedia experience, award-winning actor Max McLean takes audiences Further Up & Further In the mind and heart of one of the most imaginative and gifted writers in history.

Trouble in Mind
Dallas Theater Center, October 13-30
This 1955 comedy-drama, which was planned for Broadway but canceled when the playwright wouldn’t tone down its message, made a triumphant premiere in New York in 2021. The play follows an experienced Black stage actress through rehearsals of a major Broadway production in Alice Childress’s funny, moving, and ultimately shattering look at racism, identity, and ego in the high-stakes world of New York theater.

Fairview
Undermain Theatre & Bishop Arts Theatre Center, October 20-November 6
At the Frasier household, preparations for Grandma’s birthday party are underway. Beverly is holding on to her sanity by a thread to make sure this party is perfect, but her sister is drinking, her husband can’t seem to listen, her brother is MIA, her daughter is a teenager and maybe nothing is what it seems in the first place. Fairview, recipient of the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for drama, begins as an easygoing comedy about a middle-class black family gathering for a birthday dinner and ends somewhere else entirely.

Guards at the Taj
Stage West, October 20-November 20
India, 1648. Two hapless Imperial Guards watch from their post as the sun rises for the first time over the newly-completed Taj Mahal. But the morning light brings with it an unthinkable task that will shake the foundations of everything they thought to be true.

Disney Princess: The Concert
Disney Concerts, October 22
Broadway’s Belle, Jasmine, Anastasia, and Nala celebrate all the Disney Princesses in an evening of story, animation and song. Drama Desk nominee Christy Altomare, Tony nominee Susan Egan, Grammy nominee Courtney Reed, and BroadwayWorld Award winner Syndee Winters join forces in this concert alongside music director Benjamin Rauhala and Prince Adam J. Levy.

The Rocky Horror Show
Lyric Stage, October 26-30
The rock concert-style show is a ridiculous tribute to the science fiction and horror B movies of the '30s through the '60s. It tells the story of the newly engaged Brad and Janet, who get caught in a storm and find themselves seeking shelter at the eerie mansion of mad scientist Dr. Frank-N-Furter, where they meet a houseful of wild characters, including a rocking biker, a creepy butler, and a Frankenstein-style muscle man named Rocky.

In the Conservatory with a Knife
Bombshell Dance Project, October 27-29
Audience members can venture freely through the billiard room, the ballroom, the library, and the dining room to gather clues as they watch the story unfold. In this eerie dance-theater crossover, all the dinner guests have something to hide and none of them are safe. This production is part of AT&T Performing Arts Center's Elevator Project.

One Flea Spare
Second Thought Theatre, October 26-November 12
In 17th-century London, a city ravaged by the Great Plague with bodies mounting, the home of wealthy aristocrat William Snelgrave and his invalid wife becomes the couple’s infirmary, until a pair of intruders break in demanding food and refuge. Resigned to quarantine together, this unlikely group sees the social paradigms that once defined their behavior begin to break down. Roles shift, boundaries are shattered, and passions erupt in Naomi Wallace’s gripping 1995 drama.

Ashes of Light
Teatro Dallas, October 27-November 12
After a self-imposed five-year absence, a young man returns home to attend his father's funeral. Over the course of two evenings, mother and son, two estranged generations of Dominicans living in the Upper West Side of Manhattan, attempt to rekindle the love and appreciation for each other and their roots in the regional and English premiere of this work.

Kodachrome
Circle Theatre & Theatre TCU, October 27-November 19
Welcome to Colchester, a small town where everybody knows everybody and the pace of life allows the pursuit of love to take up as much space as it needs. Tour guide Suzanne, the town photographer, allows a peek into her neighbors’ lives to catch glimpses of romance in all its stages of development.