Theatre
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Berkies 2019
Fourth Annual Berkshire Theatre Awards
By: - Nov 13th, 2019On a night that was colder than a witch's tit the faithful packed the pews of Zion Lutheran Church in Pittefield. We gathered for the fourth annual Berkshire Theatre Awards. Because the heating system failed baby it was cold inside. But an evening in honor of great theatre proved to be a stellar and heart warming occasion.
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Chicago Actor Larry Neumann Jr.
Conversation with Nancy Bishop
By: - Nov 11th, 2019Larry Neumann Jr. is known as one of Chicago’s finest character actors. I have seen him in a wide variety of roles in the 30-plus years I’ve been a Chicago theatergoer and critic. We met at a coffee shop on Irving Park Road near his rehearsal location. It was fun to get reacquainted with Larry and talk about this new role and his career.
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Manon Lescaut By Puccini
Produced by San Francisco Opera
By: - Nov 11th, 2019Manon Lescaut holds some curious distinctions within the Puccini canon. Chronologically, the third of his nine full-length operas, the first two were failures. This was his only opera lauded at its conception by critics and audiences alike.
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Druid Shakespear's Richard III at Lincoln Center
White Lights Festival's Garry Hynes Brilliant Production
By: - Nov 10th, 2019The Lincoln Center White Lights Festival is presenting DruidShakespeare: Richard III, directed by the inimitable Garry Hynes. This play is odd for Shakespeare, who later would carefully etch the development of each character. Here we immediately meet Richard. Hynes has Aaron Monaghan rise from the grave into which all, or rather most of the people he murders or sets up for death, get dumped over the course of the evening.
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Bishop on Broadway
Coverage During NY ATCA Conference
By: - Nov 09th, 2019I spent a long weekend in New York, including a meeting of the American Theater Critics Association. Busy days but time for theater at night, of course. Somehow I managed to stay on Broadway (or close) for five plays. Here are mini-reviews of the plays I saw.
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ATCA NY Conference 2019
Day of Panels at MCC Theatre
By: - Nov 08th, 2019Located in the belly of the beast the annual Anerican Theatre Critics Association New York conferences consistently feature superb programming. The best and brightest of American theatre are as accessible as a phone call and cab ride away. This year a day of panels were held for some 60 national members and guests at the new MCC theatre complex. Where else can you encounter a Pulitzer winning playwright interviewed by a fellow Pulitzer Prize winner. The panels. convened from 9 to 5, were varied, provactive and galvanic.
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Derren Brown - Secret
Cort Theatre, Broadway
By: - Nov 08th, 2019The Master Illusionist, Derren Brown, currently excites audiences at the Cort Theatre on Broadway with his extra ordinary performance in SECRET. He and his show have been imported from London's West End and promise sold out performances for a very long time. Who would not like to be thoroughly entertained and perplexed at still reasonable Broadway prices?
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Will Arbery’s Heroes of the Fourth Turning
Off Broadway At Playwrights Horizons
By: - Nov 07th, 2019Will Arbery’s Heroes of the Fourth Turning has more religious, personal, and political exposition (read talk) than many a mind can absorb at one sitting, The play is essentially a snapshot of the current divisive state of affairs in this country.
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Wrong Man Off Broadway Musical
By 2015 Pop Songwriter of the Year Ross Golan
By: - Nov 06th, 2019Several years ago, 2015 Pop Songwriter of the Year Ross Golan, who has written for Ariana Grande, Maroon 5, Michael Bublé, and many more, developed a concept album called The Wrong Man. The project morphed into a one-man theatrical show that won Ovation Awards in Los Angeles. Now, a compelling, fully-formed, dark, rock opera appears Off Broadway.
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Tootsie the Musical
Drag Wins Tony on Broadway
By: - Nov 06th, 2019Michael/Dorothy comes alive on Broadway. The updated book by Robert Horn in the musical version of Tootsie shifts the action from the soap opera world to that of Broadway and improves the narrative and dynamics. David Yazbeck’s pop score with sparkling and penetrating lyrics adds another dimension with a sharper focus on female empowerment.
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The Height of the Storm on Broadway
Eileen Atkins and Jonathan Pryce Struggle With Loss and Memory
By: - Nov 06th, 2019This mind-bending drama is performed by a great, almost all-British cast headed by two of contemporary theater’s most renowned artists. Jonathan Pryce is André, the father. The equally formidable Eileen Atkins plays his wife.
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ATCA at Sardi’s 2019
Marisa Tomei & Charles Busch Headline Broadway Luncheon
By: - Nov 05th, 2019When Marisa Tomei developed her role in Rose Tattoo at Williamstown Theatre Festival Mandy Greenfield made sure that she was off limits to local critics. That made it all the more exciting to get up close and personal with the her during the annual ATCA lunch at Sardi's. We also enjoyed quality time with the outrageous Charles Busch. He proved to be accessible, charming and down the earth.
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Billy Elliot at Goodspeed
Boys of Ballet
By: - Oct 26th, 2019Some flaws exist in this production of Billy Elliot directed by Gabriel Barre and choreographed by Marc Kimelman. Barre has changed a few things from the original show and overall they work,
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Kingfishers Catch Fire
Play by Robin Glendinning at Irish Rep
By: - Oct 26th, 2019The play by Robin Glendinning is based on fact. Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty, the first Irish priest to hold the title of Notary of the Holy Office, spent WWII at the Vatican, where he proved to be a man of action.
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Bunkaru Theater at the White Lights Festival
Sugimoto's The Love Suicides at Sonezaki
By: - Oct 24th, 2019White Lights Festival at Lincoln Center brings bunraku Puppet Theater from Japan to The Rose Theater. Hiroshi Sugmoto, an artist of many disciplines, has updated Chikamatsu Monzaemon’s Love Suicides at Sonezaki. Monzaemon was Japan’s Shakespeare and first to advance the notion that lovers whose relationship could be realized in this world could find happiness in a Buddhist paradise.
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Wondrous Oscar Wao at Repertorio Espanol
Written and Directed by Marco Antonio Rodriquez
By: - Oct 23rd, 2019Repertorio Espanol Presents The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao based on the novel by Junot Diaz. It is written and directed by Marco Antonio Rodriquez. The Pulitzer winning novel (2008) creates a painfully socially dysfunctional character. A young Dominican man armors himself within the world of sci-fi fantasy in order to weather the difficult process of assimilation. The story is as much a tale of one man's unbearable loneliness as it is a metaphor for the scars and trauma of ruthless dictatorial oppression, social fragmentation, ultimate immigration and assimilation.
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Verdi's Nabucco
Produced by West Bay Opera
By: - Oct 22nd, 2019Nabucco evidences the Verdi sound and style associated with the masterpieces of his rich middle period. The music is melodious throughout, with demanding arias and complex ensembles, though none are among his more memorable. However, the overture, which includes many of the opera’s themes, captivates and is often performed on its own in concert halls.
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Off Off Braodway's Lively Fall Season
Duck by Tom Block and Quiet Enjoyment by Richard Curtis
By: - Oct 22nd, 2019Inside common experiences, one financial and the other political, are revealed in a broad slapstick comedy, Quiet Enjoyment and Duck, darkly humorous explorations of Snowden's dilemma and ours.
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The Chinese Lady by Lloyd Suh
Recalling 19th Century Sideshow
By: - Oct 22nd, 2019This fictional account tells of the life of the real Afong Moy, who in 1834 at age 14, became the first Chinese female to step foot in the United States. Unique to her era, only in the 20th century did Chinese women begin to trickle into this country. The Chinese Lady is a two person play by Lloyd Suh.
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Falling In South Florida
New City Players Presents Deanna Jent's Dramady
By: - Oct 21st, 2019Falling is a touching, honest look at a family caring for an autistic young man. New City Players' production presents a master class is naturalistic acting. The production runs through Sunday.
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The Thanksgiving Play By Larissa FastHorse
Holiday Hilarity at Lyric Stage Company of Boston
By: - Oct 21st, 2019The Thanksgiving Play by Larissa FastHorse at Lyric Stage Company is not the usual family oriented family entertainment. This hilarious satire comments that some 50 million turkeys are slaughtered to feed the occasion. The only juveniles suited for this production are delinquents.
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Les Miz Remains A Winner
New Production Stops In Florida
By: - Oct 17th, 2019New Production of Les Miserables immerses us in the dark, yet hopeful tale of redemption and the capacity for change. An equity U.S. touring production is docked in the Sunshine State. Jean Valjean is unrecognizable following his transformation, thanks to deft acting by Nick Cartell
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A Streetcar Named Desire
Tennessee Williams in South Florida
By: - Oct 14th, 2019Palm Beach Dramaworks presents a shattering 'Streetcar.' Actors, design team shine in South Florida nonprofit, professional theater company's vivid mounting of Tennessee Williams' masterpiece.
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Marriage of Figaro
At San Francisco Opera
By: - Oct 13th, 2019San Francisco Opera’s new production of Marriage of Figaro retains the time frame of the original (late 18th century) but moves the action from Spain to post-Revolutionary America. The shift in venue carries no significance for this opera.
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Harold Pinter's Betrayal
Revival on Broadway
By: - Oct 11th, 2019“I have often been asked how my plays come about. I cannot say. Nor can I ever sum up my plays, except to say that this is what happened. That is what they said. That is what they did.”– Harold Pinter, taken from his 2005 Nobel Prize Lecture
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