Behind scenes, too: more female leaders, support for Prop. E

We Bay Area theater people are so lucky. Our artists abound in talent, imagination, wit, bravery, compassion. To tally the artistic riches of 2018 is to be humbled before their gifts and their generosity in sharing them with us.

American theater lost a great one this year when Neil Simon died at 91, and although it’s hard to imagine anyone today dominating Broadway in the same way he did, the next generations of artists are forging their own equally valid — and often much more interesting — definitions of theater and of success. Here around the bay, both flagship institutions like American Conservatory Theater and Berkeley Rep and much smaller outfits like Golden Thread Productions and Ferocious Lotus have bestowed a wealth of artistic daring on us this year. “Weightless”: This rock opera by wife-and-husband duo Kate Kilbane and Dan Moses turned Z Space into a chill indie rock club. Their infectious melodies, tremulously sung, turned a myth from Ovid’s “Metamorphoses” inside out. In their telling, mortals might get bruised and bloodied, but we’re ultimately unfathomable to the gods who toy with us, the gods who can have anything they want in a snap of the fingers.

Women taking the helm: We’re still in the midst of a changing of the guard in Bay Area theater leadership, but 2018 brought the auspicious news that women are taking the reins of three local companies: Ariel Craft at Cutting Ball Theater, Pam MacKinnon at American Conservatory Theater and Johanna Pfaelzer at Berkeley Rep. Their vision of theater — what it can be, what stories it can tell, who tells them and who gets to listen — will

Julie Schuchard / Z Space and Piece by Piece Productions

Liz Hafalia / The Chronicle Above: Dan Moses (left), Kate Kilbane as Procne and Julia Brothers as God in the rock opera “Weightless” at Z Space. Left: Cutting Ball’s Ariel Craft is one of three women taking the reins at local companies.