So, Einstein, Picasso and a visitor from the future walk into a bar, and…the punch line to this joke is in the Hyde Park Community Players’ latest production, “Picasso at the Lapin Agile”, written by performer and comedian Steve Martin. Life is full of what-ifs, and in Picasso, Martin imagines the possibilities of an evening where Pablo Picasso and Albert Einstein happen to show up at the same bar. The play takes place in 1904, as Einstein is on the verge of publishing his “Special Theory of Relativity” and Picasso is close to painting “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon”, his groundbreaking foray into modern art. This pair of visionary figures show us what it’s like to be extraordinary in a world of normalcy. Picasso is an imaginative and colorful look at art, science, love, sex and human nature at the dawn of the 20th century. With the benefit of hindsight, the audience is privy to inside jokes and flashes of recognition of a “future” we have already seen.

Experimental Station, 6100 S. Blackstone Ave., Chicago. Friday, May 20th at 7:30pm; Saturday, May 21st at 3:30pm and 7:30pm; and Sunday, May 22nd at 3:30pm. Advance tickets ($10) are available at 57th Street Books, 57th & Kimbark, and Chaturanga Holistic Fitness, 1525 E. 55th, #302. Tickets at the door are $12.