DEAR DIARY: In Amphibian Stage Productions’ Fiction, a pair of married writers venture down a path that rarely ends well when they decide to read each other’s diaries. Staging a show about writing is always a trick considering theater, at least in part, is a visual medium. But it looks like Amphibian has pulled it off. “The acting and direction, by Mary Catherine Burke, in this production are absolutely first-rate,” Punch Shaw writes on dfw.com. “The characters, all of whom have quick wits and bloated vocabularies, spar with carefully measured ferocity. And, no matter who starts the skirmish, the eventual winner is never obvious.” Jan Farrington was also pleased. “In unskilled hands, these are characters who might have audiences rolling their eyes by the second scene,” she writes on theaterjones.com. “But by digging out every bit of warmth and humor from a script that could read as a bit detached and brittle, New York-based director Mary Catherine Burke (making her Amphibian debut) and the actors of this nimble company manage to bring it off in style.” Catch Fiction through March 17.

HAVE A SEAT: Business Council for the Arts’ 2013 Leadership Arts Institute Class has announced plans for its annual project. For Chair Art in the Park, kids in grades 6-12 will apply for the chance to make a piece of chair art. The entries that make the cut will then be auctioned off at Klyde Warren Park on May 11. All the money raised goes to the Dallas Children’s Advocacy Center. If you’ve got a youngster in your house who has the skills to take part, applications are due March 15.

QUOTABLE: “At this point it’s sort of like a glamour thing, like being part of an indie rock band. The status has changed, and the kind of work that’s coming out now is a really wide swath of independent creation.”

– Comic book artist Art Spiegelman, on the rise in stature for the art form. He spoke with dallasnews.com ahead of his appearance tonight at the Dallas Museum of Art for Arts & Letters Live.