Lynne Weiss

A PLAY TO BE THANKFUL FOR Director Tara Moses (Seminole Nation of Oklahoma/Mvskoke) leans into the challenge of bringing the satirical comedy The Thanksgiving Play to the stage with “a full cast of Native and actors of color.” The casting note for the published play, by Larissa FastHorse, a member of the Sicangu Lakota Nation…

NOISES OFF, LAUGHS ON Just in time for the holiday season, Lyric Stage Company of Boston has something for audiences eager for some silly fun. Written by Michael Frayn the quintessential farce (within a farce) is a true ensemble piece about an amateur acting troupe presenting Nothing On, the name of the play within the…

GALILEO’S THEORIES WOULD PROVE THAT THE SUN DOESN’T MOVE – GALILEO’S DAUGHTER ALSO DOESN’T MOVE It’s an intriguing notion: the ground-breaking scientist and astronomer Galileo Galilei, who defied the Catholic Inquisition to publish his observations regarding the movement of Earth around the sun, had a daughter who shared his intellectual curiosity. Dava Sobel’s 1999 biography…

A TIME-TRAVELING JANE AUSTEN What if Jane Austen had managed to read The Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan’s groundbreaking 1963 exploration of why well-educated and prosperous women were so unhappy in their roles as homemakers and mothers? Obviously, it would have been impossible for Austen (1775–1817) to do such a thing, so playwright Kate Hamill has…

SOMETIMES YOU CAN GET WHAT YOU WANT I have been in a foul mood for the past several days, looking for ways to smash the patriarchy, cursing the unseasonably warm and dry November in my soul and longing to methodically knock a few people’s hats off. Thus I accounted it high time to get to…

SETTING THE STAGE FOR AN EXTRAORDINARY CYCLE OF SHOWS How appropriate! I thought, as I stood in the August Wilson Lobby of the Huntington Theatre last night. I was about to see Sojourners, the first in the nine-play Ufot Family Cycle that celebrates multiple generations of a Nigerian and Nigerian-American family. Playwright Mfoniso Udofia was…

MEMORY AS AN ACT OF LOVE The East Coast premiere of playwright Steven Drukman’s snappy and cleverly written Pru Payne is movingly brought to the stage under SpeakEasy Stage founder Paul Daigneault’s direction. A top-notch cast gives voice to Drukman’s script, led by the especially impressive Karen MacDonald in the demanding role of Pru, a…

A PLAY THAT’S OUT OF THE BOX Like an acrobat without a net who thrills us with her daring, Iranian-German playwright Nassim Soleimanpour offers a play with virtually no set, no costumes, and an actor doing a cold read of a completely unfamiliar script to keep an audience enthralled with his 75-minute work Nassim. On…

THE LAUGHS ARE IN SPANISH AND ENGLISH, TOO Playwright Alexis Scheer draws on her Colombian-Jewish upbringing in Miami to create this comic celebration of the city’s Wynwood arts scene and the people who make it happen. Directed by another daughter of Miami, Mariela Lopez-Ponce, who, like Scheer, is now based in Boston (is it the…

MIND YOUR PEES AND QUEUES Courtney O’Connor’s masterful direction of the unpleasantly titled Urinetown: The Musical brings together numerous wonderful performances along with great music (Dan Rodriguez, music director) and choreography (Christopher Shin) in this Brechtian examination of economic inequality and environmental degradation. With music and lyrics by Mark Hollman and book and lyrics by…

A TRIUMPHANT SAGA OF A VIENNESE FAMILY The Huntington and director Carey Perloff bring Tom Stoppard‘s beautifully written Leopoldstadt to Boston with engaging performances that make the complex relationships of three generations of an extended family surprisingly easy to follow and appreciate. A cast of over thirty actors, set in four different time periods, portray…

ATMOSPHERIC, MOODY, DARK AND MODERN, ROMEO AND JULIET AT A.R.T. BELONGS TO THE AGES As summer turns to autumn, American Repertory Theater brings a dark and moody interpretation of Romeo and Juliet, one of Shakespeare’s most famous plays, to the Loeb Drama Center in Cambridge. This production from director Diane Paulus, collaborating with Sidi Larbi…

SUPPLIANT AND DEMAND Looking for a thoroughly pleasant evening on the banks of the Mystic River? Head for Chelsea’s PORT Park and a transfixing performance of The Suppliant Women, by the Greek tragedian Aeschylus. Dating back about 2500 years, it’s one of the world’s oldest known plays, brought into the present moment by award-winning playwright…

AS USUAL, THE WOMEN DEAL WITH THE MESS Hub Theatre Company‘s pay-what-you-will production of 46 Plays for America’s First Ladies offers a series of playlets as varied as the women portrayed. There are many surprises in store here. First of all, while the United States has had forty-six presidents, there have been many more First…