THE STAGE

Misalliance, Bernard Shaw's long and drawn-out comedy about sex and a whole bunch of other things, finishes its run at the Loeb tonight and tomorrow. By applying Shaw's notion of "vital life forces" to stage craft, the Summer School Repertory manages to turn this windy bit of social farce into an amusing bit of entertainment.

The Summer School Dance Center finishes its second series of performances this weekend at Agassiz Theater in Radcliffe Yard. The show combines the talents of three excellent choreographers. Elizabeth Keen, who is noted for her inventive and dramatic touches, will present her "Pale--Cool and Warm." Martha Armstrong Gray, the Dance Center's artistic director, offers a tribal work called "Primus," which features the amazing stage design of Randall Darwell. Bill Evans will add his share with a work entitled legacy. The Dance Center is offering $2 student tickets for every performance, so if you like dance and can't afford the Moiseyev or the Bolshoi, this is an extremely pleasant substitute. If you're not a student, tickets are $3 in advance and $3.50 at the door. Shows begin at 8:30.

Alfred the Great, the first part of Israel Horovitz's "Wakefield Trilogy," has nothing to do with kings or Yorkshire. It's a seriocomic Pinteresque melodrama involving two spouse-swapping couples in our own Wakefield just north of Boston, where the playwright was born. It's a handsomely acted and fascinating fable of four frustrated and funny freaks. You may believe that murder, adultery, impotence and sadism can't be amusing, but you're wrong; and you'll also have something to mull over for days afterward. But you've got only until Aug. 17, when the troupe follows up with "A Man For All Seasons," a fine play that does have to do with kings.

The Drunkard is supposedly the longest running show in the history of the universe, beating out the Aurora Borealis by three and a half days. Astronomers may quibble with this fact, but the play, written in 1843, is continuing its run at Somerville's Washington St. Opera House in any event. It's all about a man who lives somewhere to the north of Cambridge going into Boston and getting drunk, thus causing all sorts of problems for himself. There's a moral here somewhere, but it's probably gotten lost over the past 131 years. P.T. Barnum used to lead temperance parades to performances of this, and you know what Barnum said, sucker. People put shows like this on because they are great fun. Ho, ho, ho.