Theatre
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The Life and Times of Lee Harvey Oswald
Tragedies Told with Marionettes
By: - Nov 09th, 2017A human actor shines in a show about Lee Harvey Oswald featuring marionettes.Czechoslovak-American Marionette Theatre revisits tragedies in The Life and Times of Lee Harvey Oswald The production's rather tedious at times, lacking dramatic punch
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Broadway's The Play That Goes Wrong
Play-within-a-play on The Great White Way
By: - Nov 09th, 2017Prepare for belly laughs during The Play That Goes Wrong, now on Broadway. Impeccable comic timing is key to delivering abundant laughs. The unexpected is common in this play-within-a-murder-mystery-farce
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A Bronx Tale on Broadway
Musical Adaptation of Gritty Film
By: - Nov 09th, 2017A stylish, relatable musical adaptation of A Bronx Tale is now on Broadway. A tough and tender tale makes us consider our role models
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Band Visits ATCA
From Sardi’s to Broadway
By: - Nov 08th, 2017During last year's NY conference of American Theatre Critics Association (ATCA) there was a panel on the development of the musical, then in previews, of what went on to be the Tony winning musical Dear Evan Hansen. Predicting that lightning will stike twice the team for The Band's Visit discussed the transitions from film, to Off Broadway, and now a production at Broadway's Ethel Barrymore Theatre. The smart money is on running the table during the awards season.
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In the Next Room, or The Vibrator Play
By Chicago's Sarah Ruhl
By: - Nov 08th, 2017It’s a woman’s play, about an era when women’s physical and emotional needs and desires were not only misunderstood, but completely ignored. Sarah Ruhl’s In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play is a charming and titillating look at life in the bad old 19th century. In the playwright's home town it is currently on stage at Chicago's Timeline Theatre.
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King of Stage, a Documentary
Woodie King Jr. Speaks in Juney Smith's Film
By: - Nov 07th, 2017The silhouette profile of Woodie King, Jr. which often shows up in the new documentary in which his life spins out., makes him look like Alfred Hitchcock. In King of Stage by filmmaker Juney Smith, we come to see that he is at least as good a picker of stories as the mystery master.
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ATCA Sondheim Panel
Five Actors Discuss Their Iconic Roles
By: - Nov 07th, 2017The New York conference of American Theatre Critics Association ended on Sunday morning with a Stephen Sondheim panel at the nightclub Don't Tell Mama. Moderated by the critic Rick Pender, the actors Len Cariou, Harvey Evans, Pamela Myers, Kurt Peterson and Teri Ralston recalled originating now iconic roles. On every level ATCA saved the best for last,
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1966 Play by Prolific but Unknown Alice Childress
Wedding Band: A Love/Hate Story in Black and White
By: - Nov 07th, 2017Wedding Band: A Love/Hate Story in Black and White is a powerful drama of black-white relations in 1918 South Carolina, soulfully directed by Cecile Keenan at the Artistic Home. The 1966 play, written by Alice Childress, a prolific if little-known African-American playwright, has passion and relevance for a modern audience.
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Venus in Fur Sizzles
CV REP Theatre in Rancho Mirage, CA
By: - Nov 07th, 2017The on-stage chemistry between Angela Sauer and Patrick Zeller is literally palpable. Their performances fully engage the audience who become fascinated by the push and pull of playwrightDavid Ives’ characters. References to the origin of the title “Venus in Fur” also enliven the audiences’ fascination with the story.
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Berkshire Theatre Awards 2017
Founded in Memory of the Critic Larry Murray
By: - Nov 06th, 2017In his final months theatre critic, Larry Murray, founded Berkshire Theatre Critics Association. In its first annual presenttation of awards "The Berkies" he rallied to enjoy the occasion and to present the first award in his name, for service to the community. We were packed into Mr. Finn's Cabaret last year but last night the event occured before a capacity, attentive audience in the Mark St. Germain Stage of the Pittsfield company. Many more regional companies were nominated and participated in the awards evening. Next year three more companies will be eligible.
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Beckett Trilogy at White Light Festival
Conor Lovett Compels as Molloy, Malone and The Unnamable
By: - Nov 06th, 2017Judy Hagerty Lovett of Gare St. Lazare Ireland has worked for more than two decades to bring the novels of Samuel Beckett to the stage. They are magnificently delivered by Conor Lovett. The Beckett Trilogy, which includes Molloy, Malone Dies and The Unnamable, has its New York premiere in White Light Festival.
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National Chorale Celebrates 50th
Everett McCorvey a Brilliant Leader
By: - Nov 04th, 2017To listen to Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Psalms and then the raunchy, life-affirming Carmina Burana is heaven. Or hell, if you prefer it. Sometimes Carl Orff, the composer of Carmina Burana does both and it is these moments, like love joined in a soprano's stratasphere, that give particular pleasure.
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The Exterminating Angel by Thomas Ades
American Premier Has Gleaming Cast
By: - Nov 01st, 2017The creation of new works remains how the art of opera continues, against steep odds and media indifference, to grow and survive. This week, the Metropolitan Opera did their bit by opening Thomas Adès' latest opus: The Exterminating Angel.
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Conrad Tao, Charmaine Lee and Nate Wooley
Brooklyn's Memorial Hall Hosts a Ceremony
By: - Oct 31st, 2017Tao is everywhere. Tucked into the back of a stage at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, he had the nerve to portray the iconic Glenn Gould in David Lang’s opera ‘loser.’ He is in the bowels of a church for a Crypt Session, and now at Roulette, a venue created to honor Dada and chance music. He is a thrilling artist.
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Comedies at Polonsky Shakespeare Center
Marcello Magni and Joe Houben Teach Us Laughter
By: - Oct 30th, 2017Marcel is being examined and interviewed by a clown evaluator (Houben) to see if he is able to continue his career. Juggling hats, the manipulation of hands and arms, are added to basic, biking, batting, swinging, and swimming. Marcel demonstrates that, if he is no fit as a fiddle, he is facile with his limbs and trunk. No question that he can make us laugh, and cry too.
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Knives in Hens Magnificent in New York
David Harrower's Newly Classic Play Riveting
By: - Oct 29th, 2017Knives in Hens is an ineffably moving theatre piece, a three-hander which depicts the struggles of a putatively ignorant farm girl who lives in indeterminate space and time. Her movement toward growth is specified in her wish to name the world she sees about her.
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Our Town Revised in Miami Beach
World Premiere of a Reborn Classic
By: - Oct 28th, 2017A new staging of Our Town emphasizes Miami's diversity. A mult-cultural, multi-racial cast speaks English, Spanish and Creole in new, different but faithful version of Thornton Wilder's classic Our Town. Talented cast ensures classic Wilder play remains touching, yet unsentimental
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Dolores Claiborne by Tobias Picker
New York City Opera Hits a Home Run, Again
By: - Oct 27th, 2017New York City Opera's production of Tobias Picker's latest opera, Dolores Claiborne, honors the composer in a riveting theatrical presentation. Oliver Sacks explored the musical brain in his Musicophilia. The connection between the two hemispheres of the brain is enlarged demonstrably in talented musicians. So too a section of the hippocampus. Picker, who began composing at four, was studied by Sacks. Whether or not his brain reflects musicality because he started playing and composing early, or because he was born with this ability, remains to be answered. What is clear in Dolores Claiborne, as produced by NYCO, is how great his talent for opera is.
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Colonial Theatre in Pittsfield Update
Shows Through April
By: - Oct 26th, 2017Upcoming events at the Colonial include, The Airplane Family & Friends with Live Dead ‘69 (10/27), $10 Music Garage: Subtleties (11/9), Upright Citizens Brigade (UCB) Touring Company (11/11), $5 Comedy Garage: Rojo Perez (at the Garage in the Colonial Theatre lobby 11/16), Ain't Wastin' Time: A Berkshire Tribute to Gregg Allman with Rev Tor's Steal Your Peach Band & Friends (11/30) and A Christmas Carol (12/9 through 12/22).
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The Agitators by Mat Smart a World Premiere
The Story of Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglass in Rochester
By: - Oct 26th, 2017The civil rights pioneers Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglass had roots in Rochester which is mounting a world premiere about them by Mat Smart. This is the best dramatic treatment thus far to deal with their achievements and close relationship.
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Tarzan in Ft. Lauderdale
High-Flying Musical Adaptation by Slow Burn Theatre Co.
By: - Oct 23rd, 2017Lighting-heavy production of Tarzan still benefits from 'less-is-more' approach. South Florida theater company show marked by strong acting, singing, acrobatics . Musical's themes are illuminated by the director.
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A Tale of Two Cities in Pasadena
Play Adapted by Mike Poulton.
By: - Oct 22nd, 2017“A Tale of Two Cities”, published in 1859, was one of the finest novels of its day and now, 200 years later it appears on the stage of Pasadena’s classic theatre company, A Noise Within, as a bold, new, dramatic production from the pen of journeyman writer and play adaptor Mike Poulton.
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Shaw's Mrs. Warren’s Profession
At Pasadena's A Noise Within
By: - Oct 22nd, 2017Pasadena’s A Noise Within theatre company, is staging a provocative and spirited comedy production of Shaw’s “Mrs. Warren’s Profession”, a witty play about the ‘world’s oldest profession’, or is it about something else that is masquerading for a more insidious subject matter discussion: the misogyny of men in a patriarchal society who harbor the fear of being exposed for their shortcomings.
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Strange Ladies by Susan Sobeloff
Central Works and plays at Berkeley City Club
By: - Oct 21st, 2017Strange Ladies greatest strength is its informativeness about the history of the movement, and additionally about the Occoquan Workhouse Prison, where public officials contrived to imprison and abuse some of the suffrage women.
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Prince of Egypt World Premiere
Music and Lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and Book by Philip LaZebnik
By: - Oct 21st, 2017This is a musical entertainment for the many, not a Sunday School lesson for the few.
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