Uncle Peck is a polite man, able at his work, kind to those around him. He helps with the dishes and tells his nephew Bobby never to be ashamed of crying. He teaches his teenage niece Li’l Bit to drive stick because “manual gives you control”—and he wants her to have control of her life. “I think men should be nice to women,” he says. In language that conjures up the sweet musk of the sodden fields of the south as easily as it evokes the casual barbarism of homegrown misogyny, Paula Vogel’s Pulitzer-winning How I Learned to Drive weaves a story of memory, manipulation, and pedophilia in 1960s America. As directed by Kayla Adams, the Artistic Home’s production, starring John Mossman and Elizabeth Birnkrant as Peck and Li’l Bit, is intense and devastating, shocking, and human. —Irene Hsiao

Price: $20-$32