Theatre
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Hungarian State Opera Arrives in New York
Superb Company Offers Seldom Heard Masterpieces
By: - Nov 06th, 2018The Hungarian State Opera is a company full of talented artists whose work has not been presented to American audiences, unless they are fortunate enough to have visited Buda and Pest, and cities throughout the country that presents opera all the time, everywhere. The troop is in New York for two weeks, presenting opera, their orchestra and also dance, for which the Hungarians are famous.
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ATCA at Sardi’s
Critics Lunch with Broadway Stars
By: - Nov 07th, 2018The stars came out in droves for the annual luncheon with critics at Sardi's the show bis watering hole. Sixteen individuals representing thirteen current plays broke bread with the scribes.
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Waiting for Godot by the Druid Theatre
Lincoln Center's White Light Festival
By: - Nov 07th, 2018Waiting for Godot with the Druid Theater Company graces the White Light Festival at Lincoln Center. It is an evening full of laughs in a bunker. Beckett as a member of the French Resistance had escaped Paris when the Gestapo targeted him. This experience led him to create a new theatrical form after the War.
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Broadway Goes Ape For King Kong
Remake of Classic 1933 Rumble in the Jungle
By: - Nov 08th, 2018During the exposition of this retelling of the classic 1933 film there is an enervating response to a generic musical. It conveys the familiar tale of a pretty farm girl falling on hard luck trying to make it big in show business. Lured into a film shoot on remote and unihabited Skull Island things change big time. From the first thrilling appearance of Kong there is little doubt that he is the new King of Broadway.
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Thousand Pines, at Westport Country Playhouse
World Premiere by Matthew Greene
By: - Nov 10th, 2018I found this moving and fascinating. As the playwright said, “to be honest, I’d love for this play to stop being ‘relevant.’” Yes, it is a difficult subject but it is handled with such care by all involved that it is well worth seeing.
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The Doctor in Spite of Himself at Odyssey Opera
Gounod's 200th Birthday Celebrated in Style
By: - Nov 10th, 2018Odyssey Opera mounted a terrific production of Charles' Gounod's A Doctor in Spite of Himself at the Huntington Theater in Boston. Gil Rose, the inspired founder of this company, points out that critics often blame institutions for riding the coattails of a big birthday of an musical original. If this is so, why is Gounod's 200th not being celebrated. It turns out that it is, in Boston.
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Two Broadway Dramas
The Ferryman and The Waverly Gallery
By: - Nov 11th, 2018In town for the ATCA NY Theatre Conference our Chicago correspondent covered two compelling dramas. Both plays are in long runs. The Ferryman by Jez Butterworth continues through February 17 and Kenneth Lonergan’s The Waverly Gallery runs until January 27
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3rd Annual Berkshire Theatre Awards
27 Critics Voted for Prized Berkies
By: - Nov 13th, 2018For the third annual Berkshire Theatre Awards, at the Zion Luteran Church in Pittsfield, it took two hours to present trophies in 21 categories. Some 27 critics voted on awards to companies in the Berkshires extending into New York, Connecticut and Vermont. The top honors went to Barrington Stage Company with nine awards and Williamstown Theatre Festival which took home five.
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Love, Linda
Cole and Linda Porter Bio-Musical Off-Broadway
By: - Nov 14th, 2018Love, Linda is a lavish show illustrating the love Linda Porter had for her husband, the late, great composer lyricist, Cole Porter. A stylish production Off-Broadway recently ended its run. Stevie Holland, a widely-acclaimed performer, shined in the role of Mrs. Porter in the one-woman show.
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Mefistofele at the Metropolitan Opera
Christian Hale is the Devil
By: - Nov 12th, 2018The Devil always gets a bad rap. That's the premise behind Mefistofele, Arrigo Boito's lone completed opera. An ambitious setting of Goethe's Faust that retells the story from the Devil's point of view, Mefistofele used to prance its sulfur strut across the world's opera stages. But Thursday night's revival at the Metropolitan Opera was the first time that the opera had been seen, fully staged, in New York in eighteen years.
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The Book of Merman at the St. Luke's Theatre
A Parody of a Parody is Brash and Fun
By: - Nov 12th, 2018The Book of Merman is an engaging musical playing at the St. Luke's Theatre in New York. A parody of a parody, it is fresh from the first moment the two Mormon Elders, who are very young indeed, start knocking on doors in the theater district.
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Queens of the Gold Mask by Carole Lockwood
World Premiere at Ivoryton Playhouse
By: - Nov 14th, 2018Playwright Carole Lockwood’s play while set in the past resonates much too much in today’s world.
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King Kong as Spectacle
But Is the Musical Spectacular Enough for Broadway
By: - Nov 15th, 2018Yes size is definitely on the theatrical table for purposes of this “review/essay” of King Kong along with other observations. Perhaps, I should label this review with a sub-headline called “In Defense of Spectacle”.
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Church and State
A Timely Dark Comedy
By: - Nov 15th, 2018“Church & State”, now on stage at the Pearl McManus theatre, in downtown Palm Springs, explores the hot button topics and issues concerning the role of guns, the Second Amendment, the NRA, and the role that God and religion play in our politics, but not necessarily in that order.
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The Gershwin's Crazy for You
At the Alcazar Theatre in San Francisco
By: - Nov 15th, 2018In addition to great music and dance, Crazy for You is full of some of the corniest imaginable humor and inside jokes that are compatible with the tone of the work. And they are delivered well.
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ATCA Focuses on Diversity
Panel Discussions for NY Critic’s Conference
By: - Nov 16th, 2018In order to survive and remain vital American Theatre Critics Association must become younger and more diverse. Intersectionality and inclusion is an ever greater driving force for producers, theatre companies and their critics. The dynamics of that synergy were explored through panels and programming of what has evolved as an annual New York conference.
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India Pale Ale at Manhattan Theatre Club
By Punjabi-American Playwright Jaclyn Backhaus
By: - Nov 18th, 2018In a New York Times interview, the playwright, Jaclyn Backhaus, admits that the work is essentially an expanded autobiography. As it opens, an almost-30-year-old, single Punjabi-American woman is talking to herself while she’s digging into fistfuls of dirt in the backyard.
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Everything is Illuminated Adapted by Simon Block
Produced by Aurora Theatre
By: - Nov 18th, 2018Everything is Illuminated merits its place on the stage. Not everyone will like it, but it should be respected for its poignant content, interesting structure, well-defined characters, and ability to embrace humor and grief without loss of credibility.
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Kaija Saariaho Premiere at White Light Festival
Lincoln Center Produces Only the Sound Remains
By: - Nov 18th, 2018Kaija Saaariaho weaves live music, enhanced voices and electronically generated extensions of the orchestra through the Rose Theater in Only the Sound Remains. Her opera based on two Noh stories is having its US premiere at the White Light Festival of Lincoln Center. This is an intimate work which succeeds mysteriously in filling a large space.
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Once On This Island
Tony-Winning Revival Of Classic Musical
By: - Nov 19th, 2018Audiences will feel like they're not in a theater, but really an island in the Tony-Award-winning Broadway revival of Once on this Island. A hope-filled message of unity and community pervades this marvelous mounting. Caribbean-flavored music, energetic dancing, singing and authentic acting are hallmarks of this vivid staging.
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Buyer & Cellar
Jonathan Tolins' Delightful Comedy in Florida
By: - Nov 19th, 2018Playwright's fertile imagination is on full display with Buyer & Cellar near Ft. Lauderdale. Jonathan Tolins far-fetched comic-fantasy imagines a down-on-his-luck actor running a mega-star's basement shopping mall. Prolific performer Matthew Buffalo shines in several roles in play about fame, fortune, ambition. Buyer & Cellar examines complex relationship between gay men and divas.
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Rightlynd at Victory Gardens by Ike Holter
All Politics Are Local
By: - Nov 21st, 2018Rightlynd by Ike Holter begins with Nina’s awakening as a neighborhood activist and concludes two years later, as she learns what it takes to succeed in Chicago. The story line is blended with musical set pieces, dance numbers, Nina and Pac’s first date and its romantic consequences.
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It’s a Wonderful Life
At San Francisco Opera
By: - Nov 22nd, 2018It’s a Wonderful Life is a quintessential American opera in its language, content, and social perspective. Composer Jake Heggie has never been intimidated by cutting-edge contemporary opera standards and has created work that unapologetically draws on past musical forms with warmth, emotion, and melody.
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A Broadway Holiday
Thumbnails of Six Shows
By: - Nov 22nd, 2018Holiday season is prime time for Broadway. Here is a tip sheet of six shows we saw during a recent week on the Great White Way.
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Mother of the Maid by Jane Anderson
Compelling Performance by Glenn Close
By: - Nov 23rd, 2018Mother of the Maid by Jane Anderson had its world premiere at Shakespeare & Company in 2015. Since then there have been revisions . Tina Packer as Mother was recast with the star power of Glenn Close. This transfer of a burn baby burn slice of medieval barbarity continues to be an incongruous tear jerker.
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