By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic (“Steppin’ Out”) It has taken nine years for the Tennessee Williams Theatre Company of New Orleans (TWTC) to tackle one of the biggest and most intricately constructed of their namesake playwright’s works, A Streetcar Named Desire, the first to garner him the coveted Pulitzer Prize for Drama. This latest […]
By AARON KRAUSE “Bigger isn’t better.” So go the lyrics to a Cy Coleman and Michael Stewart song from the musical “Barnum.” At least, bigger isn’t always better. A fine example is New City Players’ (NCP) small scale, yet heartfelt, haunting, heartbreaking, and sizzling current professional production of Tennessee Williams’ classic, sultry, poetic, Pulitzer Prize-winning 1947 tragedy, A […]
By ROY BERKO Confession: I am not a big fan of juke box musicals, the now popular Broadway vehicle which is a genre of American musical theatre in which pre-written songs are woven, mostly with no real reason, into an often soap-opera-like story. Reality: MJ: The Musical, now on stage at the Key Bank State Theatre […]
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic (“Steppin’ Out“) After several decades in development and through various iterations, Empire, the musical that tells the story of the construction of the Empire State Building during the early days of the Great Depression and the men and women who literally bolted it into place, has finally bowed in […]
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic (“Steppin’ Out“) The Public Theater has enjoyed a well deserved reputation as a proving grounds for works that have later found great fame on Broadway. Some of these groundbreaking shows include Hair, A Chorus Line, Fun Home and Hamilton. Add to that list Suffs, which premiered at The Public […]
By LOU HARRY Prior to a performance, most theaters share a short list of expected behaviors. Turn off those cell phones. Unwrap those candies. Note the exits. However, for Hamlet, staged at Santa Fe’s Center for Contemporary Arts, in Santa Fe, New Mexico, the list is significantly different. The first rule for Exodus Ensemble’s immersive, […]