Bainbridge Performing Arts opens its 50th season Oct. 13 with the staging of Tom Stoppard’s “Arcadia,” directed by Kate Carruthers.

A gala opening reception that night will honor the BPA’s founder, Louise Mills.

“Arcadia” is a comedic murder mystery, spanning several centuries and set at an English country estate.

Carruthers said of the play, “In ‘Arcadia,’ Tom Stoppard weaves past and present, seduction and learning, research and speculation, classicism and romanticism, poetry and landscape gardening into a rich tapestry that is as breathtakingly profound as it is beautiful. Stoppard also infuses the play with a deeply ironic and irreverent humor that makes this play as highly entertaining as it is intellectual.”

As the play opens we find Thomasina Coverly (Andrea Christopherson), 13-year-old math prodigy, asking her tutor, Septimus Hodge (Ricky Coates), for the definition of “carnal embrace.”

He dodges the delicate question by explaining it as the practice of “throwing one’s arms around a side of beef.”

Thomasina’s small world also includes her mother, Lady Croom (Robin Dennis), poet Lord Byron, minor poet Ezra Chater (Fred Saas) and gardener Richard Noakes (Tim Tully).

As the play jumps to modern day we meet Thomasina’s descendant Valentine Coverly (Kirk Nordby), who is a mathematics student at Oxford, and scholars Hanna Jarvis (Brynne Edwards) and Bernard Nightingale (Tim Davidson), who is intent on proving Byron’s connection to the Coverly family and the apparent dueling death of Chater.

Also appearing are Miles Yanick as Jellaby, Jay Trinidad as Capt. Brice, Jocelyn Maher as Chloe Coverly and Carter Kight as Gus and Augustus Coverly.

Stoppard, who also wrote “Shakespeare in Love,” in this play manages to link past and present with chaos theory, fractals and the Second Law of Thermodynamics. And he manages to show them as a foundation for the human mysteries of love and attraction.

“Arcadia” is considered by many to be one of Stoppard’s best plays. It won an Olivier Award for best play and the New York Drama Critics Circle Award.

The play premiered at the Royal National Theatre of London in 1993 and hit Broadway two years later for a successful run.

Carruthers is a long-time member of the Bainbridge Island theatrical community. She was involved in BPA for several years before she and other players left the organization in 1994 to form Island Theatre. After BPA agreed to collaborate with the group Carruthers directed the first joint production, “More Fun Than Bowling,” at The Playhouse in 2002.

She has since directed several productions at The Playhouse, including the 2004 and 2005 Island Theatre productions of “The Vagina Monologues” and last season’s BPA production of “Picasso at the Lapin Agile.”

Most of the cast members have also logged considerable time on the boards.

Andrea Christopherson, a BPA Theatre School alum, snagged the lead role in this, her first Mainstage appearance.

Kirk Norby first appeared on stage as one of the “bad” kids in “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever,” and went on to become the lead singer of the popular Bainbridge-based rock group The Gruff Mummies.

Tim Davidson, BPA administrator, returns after starring as Seymour in last season’s production of “Little Shop of Horrors.”

“Arcadia” opens Oct. 13 and continues weekends through Oct. 29 at The Playhouse, 200 Madison Ave. N, Bainbridge Island. There is a pay-what-you-can preview Oct. 12 and a free performance Oct. 19, as part of a national campaign to attract new audiences to live theater called “Free Night of Theatre.”

Showtimes are 7:30 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays and 3 p.m. Sundays.

Tickets are $18 adults, $15 seniors, military and college students, $10 youth 18 and under, available at the box office, by phone at (206) 842-8569 or online at www.theplayhouse.org.