Eight Arts Must-Sees in September

All hat photographs courtesy of the Peabody Essex Museum. From left, Jo Gordon, Kiss of Death, 1994, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Crown, 1800–1900, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Stephen Jones, Silk Twist Hat, 1982, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Kirsten Woodward, Sex on the Brain, 1989, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Balenciaga, Green Straw Hat, About 1960, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Stephen Jones, honey, 2008, © Peter Ashworth; Caroline Reboux, Feather Tricorne, About 1935, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Quilted Cap, 1800–1900, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London

THE MAD HATTER

Legendary U.K. milliner Stephen Jones’s hats have graced the heads of Lady Diana and the Rolling Stones. And now through February at the Peabody Essex Museum, he’ll exhibit a stunning collection of both modern and vintage caps. Opens 9/8.

VIVE L’OCCUPY!

The American Repertory Theater opens its season with Marie Antoinette, a satire by David Adjmi about the French Revolution, the queen, and history’s most notorious one percenters. 9/1–9/29.

THE OTHER ADAMS

Historian Harlow Giles Unger chronicles the life of our sixth president—from his South Shore birth to his work as a pioneering abolitionist—in John Quincy Adams. Out 9/4, Da Capo, $27.50.

LIKE A FIFTY-SOMETHING

Madonna, the eternal dance-pop queen, brings her old hits and surprisingly rousing new tunes to Causeway Street, where she’ll get the TD Garden crowd voguing and justifying their love. 9/4

GOING SOUTH

Playwright David Lindsay-Abaire won a Pulitzer for Rabbit Hole. Now the Huntington Theatre stages his Tony-nominated play Good People, an exploration of class, fate, love, and humor as seen through the eyes of a Southie woman. 9/14–10/14.

MUSICAL CHAIRS

True, the BSO will open yet another season without a permanent conductor, but this month violinist Itzhak Perlman will lead the orchestra in a program that includes Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony—and perform solo, too. 9/22.

THOSE QUAZY QUÉBECOIS

A cross between Blue Man Group and Cirque du Soleil, Montreal performance troupe Les 7 Doigts de la Main brings its new show, Sequence 8, to the Cutler Majestic. 9/27–10/7.

AN APPLE A DAY

Nothing says autumn like Colonial villages and pick-your-own fruit, and the Apple Days festival at Old Sturbridge Village offers both. Sample many varieties, help the farmers harvest, and watch oxen grind apples in the world’s most sustainable cider mill. 9/29–9/30.