If there’s a common thread running through these picks, it’s archeology. Digging into the past to see how it illuminates our present. Whether it’s blasting through the strata of the American mall, or Burt Bacharach’s songbook, even the snakier corners of our reptilian brain, dance makers are burrowing for stories. On the opera side of things, the exhumation business is even more pronounced. One piece is actually set amid Greek ruins; another was adapted from a tragedy perhaps 1,800 years old; another goes all the way back to the Bible; and yet another reopens the case of an Army suicide from the Afghanistan War. Trust the ghosts of the past to resurface in song and dance.

DANCE

Illinoise at Park Avenue Armory (March 2–23)

The blockbuster dance-theater event of the season was inspired by Sufjan Stevens’ Illinois (2005), his landmark album of hypnotic orchestral folk-pop. Choreographed by Justin Peck (Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story) to a story co-written by Peck and Jackie Sibblies Drury (Fairview), the mystical heartbreaker follows young dreamers as they find themselves—and a community—by the glow of a campfire, not far from their own private Chicago. The ensemble includes Gaby Diaz (So You Think You Can Dance winner, season 12) and singing in the band is original Illinois vocalist Shara Nova.

1-800-3592-113592 at MITU580 (March 9–16)

Just as some AI-generated humans have too many fingers, the title of dance-theater collective CHILD’s trippy satire is a metastasizing toll-free number. It’s how you reach DiFrederico’s, a bizarro jewelry store in a New Jersey mall where everything is for sale. Twelve performers and a rocking lounge band enact arcane rituals around retail and........

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