Chita Rivera in new version of The Visit at Williamstown

Dark, depressing and downbeat as Dante’s Inferno, Swiss playwright Friedrich Dürrenmatt’s stinging drama The Visit has intrigued producers ever since its initial New York premiere electrified Broadway in 1958 with Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne making theatre history. Twice revived since then in stage productions starring Rachel Roberts and Jane Alexander, and diluted into a second-rate movie in 1964 with Ingrid Bergman and Anthony Quinn, The Visit is back this summer at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. This time it’s a musical! Originally conceived by Terrence McNally, with a somber musical score by the esteemed team of John Kander and Fred Ebb, as a vehicle for Angela Lansbury, it first lost its star and then Ebb. But it persevered, in various productions throughout the globe, all plagued with one hurdle after another. This summer, after 14 years of shaping, structuring and re-writing, it’s hammering audiences to their seats again, under the careful direction of John Doyle, in the best condition since its musical inception. And in the dazzling, legendary Chita Rivera, it’s found a polished star to bring it to life once more. A story of cutting cynicism, with Mr. Dürrenmatt’s twisted theme—in a corrupt world, you always get the kind of justice you can afford—more relevant than ever, The Visit is not easy to absorb on a sunny August day when your friends are at picnics on the beach. But invest a few hours in this production on the shamrock-green campus of Williams College and you’ll be glad you did.