Tennessee Williams’s simmering Cat on a Hot Tin Roof explores family dysfunction, Southern-style. The Pulitzer Prize-winning gothic tale has at its center a nasty character called Big Daddy who’s dying of cancer, though no one will admit it. (Everyone is either in denial or focused on the old man’s dough and doing everything they can to get it.) A secondary plot focuses on Maggie “the cat” and her husband Brick, Big Daddy’s loser son. His dreams of making it as a pro football player dashed, Brick takes it out on Maggie: He won’t make love to her despite the fact that she’s drop-dead gorgeous. (This is Williams, after all — no satisfaction.) Their lack of a sex life makes Maggie the object of endless torment by her sister-in-law, adding to her frustration. Cat may be Williams’s sexiest play — Paul Newman and Elizabeth Taylor starred in the film version and made it a steamy classic. 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays. Through September 13. Playhouse 1960, 6814 Gant Road. For information, call 281-587-8243 or visit www.playhouse1960.com. $13 to $15.

Fridays, Saturdays, 8 p.m. Starts: Aug. 29. Continues through Sept. 13, 2008

This article appears in Aug 21-27, 2008.