By ANNE SIEGEL MILWAUKEE, WI. – Don’t be late for this class: the School of Rock is astonishing audiences at Milwaukee’s Skylight Music Theatre. Based on the successful 2003 film of the same title, this was prime material to be produced on stage. No less a composer than Andrew Lloyd Webber bought the rights to […]
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic (“Steppin’ Out“) The history of Here Lies Love dates back almost two decades ago when David Byrne and Fatboy Slim came up with an improbable concept album about Imelda and Ferdinand Marcos, the despots of the Philippines who were overthrown by the civil disobedience movement People Power Revolution in […]
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic (“Steppin’ Out“) There was a time when Tallulah Bankhead was as well known a celebrity as any who dominate the social media channels of our own time. She was the wild child of her generation, beloved as an icon of stage and screen, who hung out at the Algonquin […]
By ROY BERKO David Greene, the Senior Vice President of Programming at Playhouse Square, informs theater-goers in his program notes for Girl from the North Country that “it is a non-traditional musical which features songs by music legend and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Bob Dylan.” He goes on to say, “[the songs] do not always […]
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic (“Steppin’ Out“) When award-winning playwright Lynn Nottage accepted the task as book writer for MJ, the Michael Jackson musical, she probably knew there would be critics surrounding her, finding fault with her saying too much or not saying enough about the mysterious popular figure. Nottage’s book is a truly […]
By ANNE SIEGEL The American musical theater has been graced with another revival of Company, Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s 1970 musical about our basic human need for togetherness. In this 2021 Broadway rendering by Marianne Elliott, which won an Olivier Award in London in 2019 and a COVID-delayed Tony Award for Best Revival last […]
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic (“Steppin’ Out“) Following the record setting production of The Producers, Mel Brooks set his sight on bringing another of his film classics from the silver screen to the stage. That film was “Young Frankenstein,” co-written with Brooks and his star Gene Wilder, who first proposed the idea to Brooks. […]
By ROY BERKO Former South Euclid resident and Brush High School graduate, Dr. Alan Wieder, is on a quest “to stem the time of forgetfulness.” An oral historian, Wieder has been on the faculties of both South Africa’s University of Western Cape and Stellenbosch University and is concerned that “Few young South Africans know of […]
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic (“Steppin’ Out“) When most people consider the macabre work of Stephen Sondheim and his delicious sense of dark humor, they typically point to Sweeney Todd as his greatest achievement. While that may well be for most of his fans, the fact is the tale of the “demon barber of […]
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic (“Steppin’ Out“) One of the most eagerly awaited new musicals in the country bowed recently in Milwaukee, not a typical launching place for such productions. But having the world premiere of Run Bambi Run, open at the Milwaukee Rep made perfect sense; it is, after all, based on a […]