Watch out for meddling mothers-in-law. They can make your life miserable. That’s what three husbands discover in Mexican playwright Tomás Urtusástegui’s domestic comedy The Power of Men. The mother-in-law in question has her daughters’ husbands doing all the chores. These poor guys are waiting on their wives hand and foot, while their lazy wives are sitting pretty — that is, until their men get the bright idea to pull a Lysistrata. Just like lonely wives who hold out sex until their men end the Peloponnesian War in Aristophanes’s Greek comedy, the husbands in Urtusástegui’s tale call a “bedroom strike” until their wives agree to help around the house. Now that’s a powerful idea. See The Power of Men at 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays. Through July 26. Houston Community College Theatre One, 3517 Austin. For information, call 713-718-6570 or visit ccollege.hccs.edu. $5 to $8.

Thursdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m. Starts: July 17. Continues through July 26, 2008

This article appears in Jul 17-23, 2008.