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Opera Review: ARIODANTE (Lyric Opera of Chicago)
HANDEL WITH CARE It’s hard to believe that, following its Covent Garden debut in 1735, this glorious opera seria endured 191 years of neglect. It returned to the boards in 1926, even more so in the 1970s, selling its stuff with dazzling vocal pyrotechnics, courtly dances, and a hard-driving tale of innocence traduced and true love vindicated….
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Las Vegas Theater Review: PUPPETRY OF THE PENIS (Jewel Box at the Erotic Heritage Museum in Las Vegas)
THE WRONGEST SHOW IN TOWN I never knew that I was a prude until I attended Puppetry of the Penis at The Jewel Box inside Las Vegas’s Erotic Heritage Museum. Silly me; since it had played, among other venues, at the Edinburgh Theater Festival as well as Off-Broadway for a respectable run in New York,…
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Theater Review: THE CRIPPLE OF INISHMAAN (Antaeus Theatre)
CRIPPLE THE FUN Funny and heartbreaking, Martin McDonagh’s The Cripple of Inishmaan is nothing less than a slalom run of emotional ups and downs and plot twists and turns. Antaeus Theatre’s production doesn’t necessarily hug every curve like Olympians, but the many snow jobbing characters in this 1996 dark comedy still leave an impression. As…
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DVD Review: SHAKESPEARE UNCOVERED (Series 3)
SHAKING UP SHAKESPEARE In the English language, no playwright has had as much influence on the arts as William Shakespeare (or the nobleman who many think wrote his plays and sonnets, Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford). Thousands of performances of his works have been graced (and, if bad, debased) over four centuries, so there’re…
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Theater Review: HYPE MAN (Fountain Theatre)
HYPER-ACTIVISM A promising hip-hop group formed by two childhood friends — a white writer and a black hype man — is thrown off its beat by racial tensions in the West Coast premiere of a powerful, funny and meaningful drama: Hype Man by Idris Goodwin. The Fountain Theatre has opened it’s 2019 season with the third…
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Theater Review: WITNESS UGANDA (The Wallis)
WITNESSING UGANDA IS AMAZING, EVEN THOUGH THE SHOW NEEDS WORK Griffin is a young black New York actor in search of more than a career. When he is kicked out of his church choir because he’s gay, it prompts him to join a volunteer program working with orphaned youth in Uganda. Once there in the…
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Theater Review: THE MAN WHO WAS THURSDAY (Lifeline Theatre in Chicago)
IF IT’S THURSDAY, IT MUST BE LIFELINE Deemed a “metaphysical thriller,” The Man Who Was Thursday is religious writer G.K. Chesterton’s celebrated satire from 1908. Intentionally confounding its characters as much as its plethora of plots, it’s a very rational romp. Chesterton’s political parable conjures up a conspiratorial world of bomb-throwing anarchists, proletarian poets, and single-minded and…
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Chicago Theater Review: ACT(S) OF GOD (Lookingglass)
TOO MANY ACT(S) Even apocalypses, it seems, can be goofy, disruptive, and “meta” — if you go by Lookingglass Theatre Company’s irritating and overlong world premiere. With two intermissions that sprawl across 150 not so necessary minutes, this dark offering by ensemble member Kareem Bandealy indulges in some very cute doom. Before it’s over the…
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Opera Review: LA TRAVIATA (Lyric Chicago)
MISSING A FEW NOTES It’s quite a treat to have two Verdi operas in one season, especially two of the composer’s best. Yet neither of these similarly named operas gets a new production. Whereas Il Trovatore had first been performed during the 2014/15 season, so La Traviata was performed in 2013/14. I did not see…
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Theater Review: WHAT IF THEY WENT TO MOSCOW? (Christiane Jatahy at REDCAT)
YOU MOSCOW, YOU MOSCOW The avant-garde seems more interested in re-invention these days than in invention, but from the point of view of someone who had thought that there was nothing new under the sun in the theater, it is amazing to come across, in the space of one year, Daniel Fish’s re-imagining of Oklahoma! in…
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CD Review: BULLDOZER: THE BALLAD OF ROBERT MOSES (Original Off-Broadway Cast Recording)
BULLDOZED It breaks my heart that another poorly made production with no soul or message gets recorded as an Original Cast Recording. Those who may think that Bulldozer is a musical about construction equipment should read the subtitle: The Ballad of Robert Moses, which is indeed about the renowned and controversial “master builder” of mid-20th century…
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Theater Review: LIGHTS OUT: NAT “KING” COLE (Geffen Playhouse in Westwood)
UNFORGETTABLE AND FORGETTABLE AT THE SAME TIME Well, here’s a show that, while it doesn’t defy description, is nonetheless perplexing. As with Matthew Borne’s Cinderella, now playing across town, only you can decide whether or not the convoluted goings on play second fiddle to the astounding talent and dancing on stage. Co-written with Coleman Domingo…
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Dance Review: ASTAIRE DANCES 2: FRED & GINGER (American Contemporary Ballet)
LET’S FACE IT: THIS IS MUSIC AND DANCE The classiest dance company in town offered its longest and most romantic program yet — a combination of Balanchine and Astaire, two of the 20th century’s greatest and most influential choreographers. The great ballet choreographer George Balanchine compared Fred Astaire to Bach, and Baryshnikov claimed Astaire gave him…
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Los Angeles Theater Review: THE JOY WHEEL (Ruskin)
JOY TO THE WHEEL After 40 years of marriage, the times they are a-changin’ for Frank and Stella Conlin, who now want very different things. On the day of Frank ‘s retirement party, he parades around the living room in his rented tuxedo, attempting to nail his retirement speech. He even took a Toastmaster’s course which not only…
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Chicago Theater Review: TWILIGHT BOWL (Goodman)
SHE STRIKES! SHE SCORES! WELL, BOWL ME OVER It’s only women who perform, design, direct, write, and otherwise shape this Goodman Theatre world premiere. Rebecca Gilman’s Twilight Bowl represents a healthy change of insiders. Making up for lost chances and time, this coming-of-age, slice-of-life depicts six small-town, twentysomething friends across several seasons. Their getaway time is spent…
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Theater Review: THE MOUNTAINTOP (Garry Marshall Theatre in Burbank)
BECAUSE IT’S THERE What if Dr. Martin Luther King was a down-to-earth, simple, vulnerable human being like the rest of us? What if human existence could be viewed from another dimension, one that allowed the viewer to weigh the pluses and minuses of the greater good versus personal choice, or the math of one human…
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Theater Review: FAMILIAR (San Diego’s The Old Globe)
FAMILIAR TERRITORY If familiarity does indeed breed contempt, then Danai Gurira’s family tragicomedy about whose legacy will control the future is aptly named Familiar. The title alludes to family; when loved ones squabble with disdain, disrespect, and disapproval over who they are and where they come from, the play asks, just what is familiar? A…
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Theater Review: TINY BEAUTIFUL THINGS (San Diego’s the Old Globe)
LETTERS FROM THE LOVELORN LEAP OFF THE PAGE Dear Sugar, I have a problem. My editor assigned me to review a play that does not follow conventional theater techniques, has only one known character, and doesn’t actually have a plot. What should I do? Confused Critic in San Diego Dear Confused Critic, You don’t have…
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Review: THE SCARLET IBIS (Chicago Opera Theater)
A SMALL STORY SOARS IN THIS NEW OPERA Right now the Studebaker Theater houses a wonder. A chamber opera with a heart of gold, The Scarlet Ibis, with a supple score by Stefan Weisman and lyrical libretto by David Cote, is based on a 1960 short story by the late James Hurst. In only 95 minutes…
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Theater Review: CRAZY FOR YOU (San Diego Musical Theatre in San Diego)
A SWEET EMBRACEABLE SHOW In 1930, a musical called Girl Crazy, with a score by George and Ira Gershwin, opened on Broadway to moderate success, running 272 performances. The rarely-revived show didn’t have the chops to endure the decades, but the music from it certainly did. Girl Crazy gave us memorable tunes, like “Bidin’ My…
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