Santa Monica Rep, which dazzled audiences and sold out some months ago with its fanciful production of one of Shakespeare’s most fanciful plays, “The Tempest,” at the Annenberg Beach House,has returned to the stage with an utterly contemporary play, “Proof,” a Pulitzer and Tony Award-winning play by David Auburn.

Following the death of her father, a mathematical genius, Catherine, a prodigy herself, is overwhelmed by her tumultuous emotions, which are exacerbated by the unwelcome visit of her estranged sister, a developing romance with one of her father’s students, and her discovery of one of her father’s notebooks.
On reading it, she begins to think that rather than inheriting her father’s genius, she has been seized by his madness.

“Proof” was directed by Sarah Gurfield.

Church in Ocean Park, 235 Hill St. Information: 213-268-1454
Tickets: $20 general admission, $15 students. Pay-what-you-can Monday, April, 23 (reservations required) Runs through May 12.