HELEN MUSA leads this week’s “Arts in the City” column with the news that “The Simon & Garfunkel Story” is coming to town.

“THE Simon & Garfunkel Story” sees UK performers William Sharp, as Paul Simon, and Oliver Cave, as Art Garfunkel, telling the tale of how two young boys from Queens, New York, went on to become perhaps the world’s most successful music duo of all time, split, then came together in the 1981 Central Park reunion concert. Featuring ’60s imagery video projections and a full band, the show includes hits such as “Mrs Robinson”, “Bridge Over Troubled Water” and “The Sound of Silence”. Canberra Theatre, August 25. 

“TIM,” the novel written by Colleen McCullough and famous for the movie starring a young Mel Gibson, has been turned into a stage play by Tim McGarry. Briefly, Tim is a 25-year-old labourer with a mild intellectual disability who forms a life-changing relationship with Mary. A touring production directed by Darren Yap will be at Queanbeyan Performing Arts Centre, August 25-26. 

IN another adaptation, Perform Australia is staging the world premiere of “The Getting of Wisdom” based on Henry Handel Richardson’s novel, by Canberra playwright Elizabeth Avery Scott. The performers are all members of a specialist high school program for Years 7-10, and Scott says: “It’s surprising how little the preoccupations of teenage girls have changed, more than a century after this story was conceived.” Tuggeranong Arts Centre, August 17-19. 

THE second Australian Playwrights’ Festival has the theme, “Safe Spaces, Risky Ideas”. Speakers include playwrights Donna Abela and Noëlle Janaczewska, and director Wesley Enoch. ARA Darling Quarter Theatre, Sydney, August 25-27. 

MUSIC for Canberra presents “Morning Melodies – Mélodies Matinales”, an orchestrated concert conducted by Louis Sharpe that takes listeners to the romantic streets of Paris, the countryside and the halls of historic châteaux. Wesley Uniting Church, 10.30am, August 26. 

SUTTON Village Gallery in Camp Street is fast becoming the place to go on weekends, with the bookbinding exhibition “Reflections of a Philosophical Voyager” continuing until August 20, followed by Diana Reynolds’ Rule’s show of her original artwork from August 21-September 10, including the launch of her children’s book, “Eddy for Endangered Fauna”, on August 26.