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Theater

Time it Was

by Ralph Hammann July 14, 2011

I’d wondered if Michael Weller’s classic, which is set in the school year of 1965-66 and concerns a group of college roommates about to graduate, would come across today as a dated curiosity or a ...

Originally a double album of conceptually linked songs released by the Who in 1969, Tommy was the first music to be popularly designated a “rock opera.” Though some work in that vein had been done ...

Colonial Theatre

Cabin Pressure

by John Rodat July 6, 2011

In 1991, Marc Camoletti's Boeing-Boeing was entered into the Guinness Book of Records as the most-performed French play in the world—30 years after its debut. To gain such recognition over such countrymen as Voltaire, Molière, ...

Playfull Potpourri

by James Yeara July 6, 2011

At the beginning of the one-act that closes the first set of the Play by Play festival, graduate student Ethan (Timothy W. Hull) stands downstage, eagerly enunciating every syllable. His eyes and vowels seem to ...

I Like It

by B.A. Nilsson July 6, 2011

A small banjolele emerges from the upstage curtain of the thrust stage, and the player gives the opening chords to “It’s a Sin to Tell a Lie.” The curtain parts ...

Redemption Song

by Ralph Hammann July 6, 2011

In her first season as the WTF’s artistic director, Jenny Gersten is defining herself as a risk taker who is willing to mount plays of conscience and depth. Three Hotels hardly promises the commercial success ...

Myth Adventures

by John Rodat June 29, 2011

In K of D, an Urban Legend, an unnamed narrator (“the girl, who does most of the talking” in the script) begins by telling the audience that the story she’s going ...

Train to Nowhere

by James Yeara June 29, 2011

Director David Cromer is a certified genius. Even without his 2010 MacArthur “genius” grant, the mark of Cromer’s genius blazed in the excellence of his Our Town, which ran for 18 ...

1 comment

A Natural

by B.A. Nilsson June 23, 2011

It’s a fully formed but imaginary universe that book writer Abe Burrows crafted when he adapted two Damon Runyon stories (and several ancillary characters) into one of the most successful musicals of 1950. Runyon’s genius ...

Barrington Stage Company

Master Chef

by B.A. Nilsson June 8, 2011

This theater review could as easily be filed under food. The one-man show opens at dinnertime, as young Frank’s mother, Maria, prepares the evening meal, its possibilities an incantation: “Manicotti, cannelloni, fettuccine, linguini, macaroni, rigatoni, ...

Capital Repertory Theatre

Most Mostel

by The Staff May 25, 2011

When actor Jim Brochu is first revealed in the character of Zero Mostel, his makeup and aspect looked pretty good. He’d captured an essence, I thought, of the performer I know only from film and ...

Barrington Stage Company

By the Beautiful Sea

by James Yeara May 5, 2011

Kingdom of the Shore kicks into gear at the beginning of the second act. Cathleen (Mhari Sandoval), the youngest and prettiest Moloney sister, drinks wine and flitters across the wicker couch ...

Capital Repertory Theatre

True Liberation

by B.A. Nilsson May 5, 2011

Call it a theatrical happening or a political screed—Hair is a late-’60s artifact that lacks a coherent book and sports a poorly crafted score, yet, as the revival production ...

Proctors

Life Is Beautiful? Really?

by John Rodat April 13, 2011

As unhappy endings go it would be tough to match, never mind top, Cabaret. Depicting, as it does, Berlin in 1931 as the Nazi party is gaining power, the musical is, necessarily, ...

1 comment Cohoes Music Hall

We Have Created Enchantment

by John Rodat April 6, 2011

Hamlet is widely regarded as the ultimate theatrical role for male actors, and many of the stage’s (and screen’s) best and most celebrated have taken it on. It is that very number and variety that ...

1 comment

At His Ease

by Shawn Stone April 6, 2011

Palace Theatre, March 30 “Who cares?” Steve Martin earned one of the biggest laughs of the “Conversation With Steve Martin” when he made this reply to a fan who asked, “What was the first song you learned ...

Hat and Heart

by James Yeara March 23, 2011

"Hats are like people: Sometimes they REVEAL and sometimes they CONCEAL.” Roman Tataowicz’s set for Crowns bears the quote in raised relief like a memorial on a false procenium of smooth cream plaster. Beneath it, ...

Hakuna Matata

by B.A. Nilsson March 10, 2011

Stage spectacle has become a maelstrom of lights and props, loud music and gimmicks, but the most compelling entertainment still needs humans—human figures and voices and conflicts. Which is why the mask-and-puppet imagery of The ...

Proctors

Another Opening

by Kathryn Geurin February 23, 2011

Schenectady Light Opera Company was bustling on Monday evening as the company prepared for Friday’s opening performance of The Drowsy Chaperone. Actors filed on stage for mic checks as crew members brushed fresh paint onto ...

Good Grief

by John Rodat February 9, 2011

Though Dog Sees God: Confessions of a Teenage Blockhead has no official association with the estate of Charles M. Schulz—a fact the program notes are careful to highlight—the inspiration for the show is blatant: What ...

Confetti Stage

That’s Entertainment

by James Yeara February 9, 2011

‘Seeing is believing,” Louis de Rougemont (Martin LaPlatney) declares in his concluding dare to the audience in Capital Repertory Theatre’s engaging production of Shiprwrecked! An Entertainment, an adventure of pure theatrical magic. From the moment ...

Capital Repertory Theatre

To Life

by B.A. Nilsson January 5, 2011

MUSIC BY JERRY BOCK, LYRICS BY SHELDON HARNICK, BOOK BY JOSEPH STEIN, DIRECTED BY SAMMY DALLAS BAYES PROCTORS, THROUGH JAN. 9 When Fiddler on the Roof opened on Broadway in 1964, musical theater was still supplying songs ...

Proctors