Hamptons summer arts season features theater, music and paintings

From world-premiere performances to world-class paintings for sale, the Hamptons summer arts season is ready to take its bow.

THEATER

Saturday is opening night of the silver anniversary season at Bay Street Theater and the company marks the occasion with a world premiere — just as it did for the opening of its first season 25 years ago.

Following four previews this week, “The Forgotten Woman,” by Jonathan Tolins, author of “Buyer & Cellar,” has its official opening with Ashlie Atkinson (“Steve,” “The Wolf of Wall Street”) in the title role of a gifted soprano who’s terrified about her impending operatic breakthrough. When a handsome reporter arrives for an interview in her Chicago hotel room, she finds herself grappling out loud about her less-than-diva-like life. “The Forgotten Woman” runs through June 19.

Bay Street’s summer season continues June 28-July 24 with Pulitzer-winning author Alfred Uhrys’ “The Last Night of Ballyhoo,” set on the evening of a Jewish debutante ball and the opening of “Gone With the Wind” in Atlanta. The season finale, Aug. 28, is a re-imagining of the Lerner and Loewe classic “My Fair Lady,” featuring a two-piano arrangement of the beloved score.

The highlight of the summer theater offerings at Guild Hall’s John Drew Theater is Steve Martin’s “The Underpants,” a farce adapted from the 1911 German play in which a woman is humiliated in front of the citizenry of their Düsseldorf hometown when her bloomers fall to her ankles just as the king passes by during a parade. It opens on Thursday, June 9, and runs through June 26.

Also at the Drew, Charles Busch presents “The Lady at the Mic,” his cabaret tribute through song and personal anecdotes to Elaine Stritch, Polly Bergen, Mary Cleere Haran, Julie Wilson and Joan Rivers. It’s a one-night-only event, July 3. Busch, who performs in drag, is accompanied by pianist Tom Judson. “Chita: A Legendary Celebration” plays the Drew July 23 as Chita Rivera re-creates signature moments from her career, among them numbers from “West Side Story,” “Chicago” and “Kiss of the Spider Woman.”

Notable one-nighters at the Westhampton Beach Performing Arts Center this summer include “Alan Cumming Sings Sappy Songs,” July 9, as the actor known for wildly divergent roles (The Emcee in “Cabaret,” a one-man “Macbeth” and Eli Gold on “The Good Wife”) showcases his singing and storytelling. Another Tony winner, Sutton Foster, now starring in “Younger,” sings her Broadway favorites July 23 on the same stage.