"Ruined"

Lynn Nottage’s shattering 10-character play, which won the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, is set in a tin mining town during the civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo. A female business owner runs a thriving bar and poolroom that acts as a neutral gathering place—a cultural equator for soldiers and miners of various factions. But the pointless bloodshed of war is less Nottage’s focus than the routine rape and sexual abuse suffered by the bar’s servers. African Heritage Cultural Arts Center, 6161 NW 22nd Ave; $30–$35