By AARON KRAUSE FT. LAUDERDALE — The lyrics resonate chillingly in the wake of the recent mass school shooting in South Florida, leaving 17 dead – and another shooting about a month later in Maryland, leaving two dead: Change don’t come easy You gotta believe me It ain’t gonna happen overnight. Change don’t come quickly, […]
By AARON KRAUSE BOCA RATON — On the Playbill’s cover, gold, upper case letters spell out the title of the enchanting musical playing at The Wick Theatre and Costume Museum through April 8. If the gold coloring and capitalization are coincidence, they’re appropriately symbolic. That’s because we need a “Brigadoon” these days. It’s difficult not […]
By AARON KRAUSE MIAMI — People attend live theater because they “feel other people’s emotions, see the world like they do,” opines a character in Dancing Lessons. The character, Senga Quinn, could easily be talking about the play in which she appears. The taut, yet meaty piece by Mark St. Germain is running through March […]
By ALAN SMASON, Theatre Critic, WYES-TV (“Steppin’ Out“) The Jefferson Performing Arts Society brought out an oldie, but a goodie this past week when it opened the Roger Bean standby The Marvelous Wonderettes, a four-woman mashup of late 1950s and early 1960s pop classics. Directed and choreographed by Jonathan Drury, this cast has some amazing […]
By EDWARD RUBIN Celebrating its 50th anniversary, New York City based IATI Theater Todo Vanguardia which is devoted to contemporary, cutting-edge Latino works, could not have selected a more compelling and beautifully crafted play than Rhett Martinez’ Three On A Match, which examines state sponsored terrorism in Latin America during the 1970s and 1980s, and […]
By AARON KRAUSE CINCINNATI — Theater and history buffs have a rare chance in Cincinnati to witness Shakespeare like they’ve never experienced in school. Chances are, you never studied Othello in the modern, painfully-timely manner Cincinnati Shakespeare Company (CSC) is presenting the Bard’s tragedy. Folks also might not have learned about the first African American […]
By ROY BERKO The history of American musical theater is laced with firsts and trendsetters. Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Oklahoma” introduced the well-made book musical in which a story was told, with music, lyrics and dance all integrated and setting the pattern of the first act ending with a conflict that would be solved in the […]
By ALAN SMASON, Theatre Critic, WYES-TV (“Steppin’ Out“) While ruminating about the current production of A Streetcar Named Desire playing at Le Petit Theatre du Vieux Carré, there was the thought of a scene in the hilarious fake rock biopic “This Is Spinal Tap” that sprang to mind. In describing an amplifier’s output, Christopher Guest’s […]
By EDWARD RUBIN “Every time I have sex I get into a relationship. Every time I get into a relationship I stop having sex. I found the Bermuda Triangle. It is between my legs. Everyone who goes there disappears out of my life.” – Penny Arcade from Longing Lasts Longer After three years of globetrotting […]
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic (“Steppin’ Out“) When Robert Harling first created the six Chinquapin, Louisiana leading ladies who hang at Truvy’s salon, America was still living through the Reagan years. Steel Magnolias was Harling’s reference to the nature of the ladies, who, season after season, stand firm and tall like trees, dealing with the […]