Joel Beers

CUCKOO FOR COCOANUTS In its 79-year history, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival has cycled through Shakespeare’s canon three times. That’s impressive. But here’s a vote from this corner that the next oeuvre to be staged in Ashland is that of the Marx Brothers. Two years ago, OSF mounted an adaptation of the Brothers’ 1930 classic film…

LOST IN SPECTACULAR SPACE It’s easy to get lost during the world premiere production of A Wrinkle in Time, particularly if you’re not familiar with the classic science fiction/fantasy novel it’s based upon. Heady concepts like  tesseracts and bending the time and space continuum fly by; there are journeys to bizarre worlds populated by equally bizarre…

LBJ’S RELEVANCY After premiering at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in 2012 and moving to American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Robert Schenkkan’s All the Way became the hot ticket on Broadway last year. Positive reviews and the presence of Bryan Cranston (from the AMC drama Breaking Bad) in the lead role of Lyndon B. Johnson had…