In a city whose artistic reputation is grounded more in underground experimental work than major-league revivals of well-known standards, it's refreshing to come across a theater company that can stage chestnuts like Shakespeare's As You Like It, Genet's The Maids, and Sartre's No Exit and keep you on the edge of your seat for three hours. Working under the fitting tagline "Risk Is This," the Cutting Ball's artistic director, Rob Melrose, has a talent for mining classics for hidden themes and bringing musty old texts to life with intelligent physicality and arresting visual metaphor. The Cutting Ball doesn't solely produce canonical plays — the world premiere of Kevin Oakes' The Vomit Talk of Ghosts and an annual New Plays Festival testify to its range — but the daredevil approach to standards is what places it a cut above the rest.