In this week's paper, you'll find a preview of Fertile Ground, Portland's annual festival of new theatrical works, plus dance and performance art and folk operas and workshops of plays to come. And I'd recommend taking a look at it, because Fertile Ground starts today, and the giant lineup can be daunting to wait through. You can plan out your Fertile Ground schedule here—tickets and passes are still available, although I've heard than many performances are full-up, so act now. You can even see one of our picks, down, TONIGHT! Here's the description from our round-up:

The frowny-faced emojis on overunder arts' promotional materials speak the truth: down is a play about sadness, "aimed at exploring the lived experience of depression." Down also boasts what's arguably one of the festival's most experimental stage set-ups: simultaneous video projection and live performance, with a partial barrier between performance and viewing spaces, mimicking the bell jar isolation of depression.

You can see all of our picks for Fertile Ground here, running a broad, strange gamut from fully formed world premieres with continuing runs after the festival, to delightful glitter-bombs, to at least one performance involving Goya and pigs in an art gallery. Oh! You should definitely go see some of these performances, that is, unless you like your theater dull and predictable.