Oh, what a beautiful play

OKLAHOMA!

Chichester’s main stage is busting out all over with high-kicking cowboys, and the sound of one of America’s greatest musicals. Director Jeremy Sams has taken a semiadventurous route in giving two terrific black actors – Emmanuel Kojo and Amara Okereke – the pivotal roles of misfit farmhand Jud and the heroine Laurey, which raises lurking questions about who were the winners and losers of the pioneering spirit the show ostensibly celebrates. Chichester Festival Theatre (01243 781312), until Sept 7

WUTHERING HEIGHTS

Bleak Brontë and the lush gardens of Oxford academe have an innate incongruity, but there’s such finesse to April de Angelis’s al fresco adaptation that the result is spellbinding. Tyler Conti looks like a star in the making as the brooding Heathcliff.

Wadham College Gardens, Oxford (01865 305305), until Aug 17

THE BRIDGES OF MADISON COUNTY

Even top director Trevor Nunn can’t give the kiss of life to this cloyingly earnest musical adaptation of the bestselling book about a housewife in Sixties Iowa who falls for a handsome photographer. One to avoid. Menier Chocolate Factory, London SE1 (020 7378 1713), until Sept 14