Paola Bellu

ANDRÉ DE SHIELDS THE REDEEMER André De Shields should be a landmark; for over six decades, he has towered over the worlds of theatre, film, and television with the kind of presence that cannot be imitated. So it is only fitting that he brings Molière’s Tartuffe to another historical New York institution: the House of…

RECONCILING WITH SHANLEY’S PAST In Italian American Reconciliation, playwright John Patrick Shanley, best known for Moonstruck and Doubt, returns to the Bronx of his youth where conversations required full hand choreography, and no emotion was considered too loud or hazardous. This love story is set in Little Italy in 1986, the year of the play’s…

SWEET LIES, STICKY MEMORIES, BITTER GUILT; THE HONEY TRAP STINGS AT IRISH REP In Northern Ireland, The Troubles only ended some 25-30 years ago, though their tensions and legacies reach far deeper into time. Today, Leo McGann‘s play The Honey Trap, now at the Irish Repertory Theatre, reminds us that it was never a tidy…

Justice without mercy becomes punishment, and mercy without justice becomes apathy. But how do we strike the balance when the system and the society behind it seem to have forgotten both? In And Then We Were No More, playwright Tim Blake Nelson invites us into a future so plausible it stings, in an unnamed state…

THE WILD DUCK TAKES FLIGHT: TRUTH, LIES AND QUACKING DELUSIONS While Shakespeare agonized over “to be or not to be,” Henrik Ibsen was more concerned with “why is everyone being so fake?” It’s existential dread versus emotional fraud, and I thought of these two drama kings because The Wild Duck, Ibsen’s play on delusion and…

THE FINE ART OF A THREE-MAN MASTERPIECE Yasmina Reza’s Art returned to Broadway last night starring Neil Patrick Harris, Bobby Cannavale, and James Corden, and it is a tight, acidic joyride through ego and insecurity, wickedly funny. If you have ever done the silent math of friendship: who listens, who cares, who gives more, who…

When I hear the name Pericles, I naturally think of the great Athenian statesman who helped shape democracy in the 5th century BC, a true hero of history. It is amusing that Shakespeare and George Wilkins borrowed the name for a completely different hero, reworking in 1609 the soapy medieval legend of Apollonius of Tyre…

YOU WILL ABSOLUTELY WHAT YOU WILL While we are still grappling with questions of gender, identity, and societal roles like troglodytes, we need to remember that Shakespeare was exploring these human complexities with intelligence, nuance, and humor over 400 years ago. In Twelfth Night, written around 1601, he crafted a brilliant pastiche of mistaken identities,…

JOIN THIS TOP BANANA FOR THE RIDE OF THE SUMMER If you’re heading to the Nederlander Theatre expecting Jeff Ross to come out swinging with savage roasts about Charlie Sheen’s liver or Elon Musk’s social skills, that ain’t Take a Banana for the Ride. Written and performed by the actor, this is not your typical…

AMAZE TURNS SLEIGHT OF HAND INTO SLEIGHT OF HEART; THE MOST DAZZLING TRICK IS MAKING YOU CARE Jamie Allan, the UK’s original technology magician, brings his new work Amaze to New York’s New World Stages after a successful run in London. Co-created with Tommy Bond and cleverly directed by Jonathan Goodwin, it is a personal…

ANIMATION, POLITICS, AND THE ART OF BEING HUMAN Cameron Darwin Bossert’s The Animals Speak closes his Disney-centered trilogy A Venomous Color (produced by Thirdwing) which began with The Fairest in 2021 and continued with Burbank in 2022. This final installment, now playing at The Wild Project, ventures far beyond the animation desks, landing on a…

THE WEIGHT OF WHAT REMAINS In Brooklyn’s charming Fort Greene, Bubba Weiler makes his playwriting debut with Well, I’ll Let You Go, a lightly funny meditation on grief and healing, brought to the stage at The Space at Irondale under the direction of Jack Serio (Grangeville). It’s a nonlinear domestic drama that recounts the unraveling…

Hollywood is full of iconic love stories but none is quite as brilliantly weird and tragically sweet as the romance between Gene Wilder and Gilda Radner, two comedy legends who fell madly in love somewhere between a silly goof and a punch line. And it is hard to think of somebody wanting to put their…

SIGNED, SEALED AND DELIVERED: PEN PALS GETS AN ENCORE RUN Casting has been revealed for Michael Griffo’s play Pen Pals, which is headed back Off-Broadway at DR2 Theatre with a rotating cast of actors beginning August 15, 2025. Stage and Cinema‘s rave review for the original production is republished below. See you at the theater!…

GHOSTS POURED NEAT Conor McPherson’s The Weir, a beloved staple for Irish Rep, returns for its fourth production under the intimate, finely tuned direction of Ciarán O’Reilly. This unusual and deeply human play walks you into a small, wind-battered pub in rural County Donegal for “just a quick pint,” only to watch you stumble out…