Gov’t Mule Plays Stage AE; ‘This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things’ at Carnegie Stage (Thurs., 8/18/16)

1) Southern rock jam band Gov’t Mule follows the trail to Pittsburgh. The Mule started in ’94 as a side project for the Allman Brothers Band guitarist Warren Haynes and bassist Allen Woody, who passed on in ’00. Haynes has led the band forward through an additional 15 albums, including Shout, which reached a peak position of 32 on the U.S. album charts. The Mule’s melodic, guitar-drenched sound can be heard in songs like “Soulshine” and “Beautifully Broken.” With the Allman Brothers currently disbanded, Gov’t Mule is a great band to get your Southern-fried rock fix from. In addition to their own songs, The Mule includes covers from such artists as The Beatles, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Led Zeppelin, Robert Johnson, and Neil Young. Also on the bill is Blackberry Smoke. Doors open at 7:30 p.m. Stage AE  400 North Shore Dr., North Shore.

2) The Entertainment Central award for Best Title of an Original Theater Piece goes to This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things. It is a statement that everyone has heard and some people are quite familiar with, from hearing it uttered in their direction more than once. Yet it makes you eager to find out what the Why(s) could be, since the complaint couldn’t possibly be about your own careless habits or the dog that is your dog because you were the one who wanted it. This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things is an evening of one-woman sketch comedy by Heidi Nagle, the resident stage manager at off the WALL productions and also founder and co-artistic director of the comedy troupe The Harvey Wallbangers. Nagle has billed her one-woman show as “an abstract exploration into the human psyche,” but one suspects that some parts may be specific and physical. 8 p.m. Continues through August 20. At Carnegie Stage, 25 W. Main St., Carnegie. (MV)

3) After years of working at the intellectually lunatic fringes of the theater scene, Christopher Durang is finally certified as a major playwright. His Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, a comical take-off on Chekhov, won the 2013 Tony Award for Best Play. Now it’s time to catch up with previous Durangments. His plays have been silly/wicked satires on subjects from religion (Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You) to U.S. foreign policy (The Vietnamization of New Jersey), and Pittsburgh’s The Summer Company is staging one that ranks very high on the Durang scale: A History of the American Film. The title makes it sound like a ponderous college course, but it’s a 1978 Broadway musical co-written by Durang with Mel Marvin. In rapid-fire sketches, the actors portray parodies of stock characters and scenes in American movies from the 1920s to the ‘70s. Citizen Kane has its sacred-cow credentials examined, and due treatment is given to war movies, detective movies, and more. A History of the American Film is a double-barreled lampoon that pokes fun at Hollywood while showing how its films reflect the course of our society over the years. Plus, there’s music. Performances through August 28. In the Genesius Theater on the Duquesne University campus, Seitz Street at Locust Street, Uptown. (MV)

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