2,704 stories by "Bill Hirschman"
The world premiere of Michael McKeever's Finding Mona Lisa at Actors Playhouse initially might seem a light, fascinating beach read about Leonardo DaVinci's masterpiece -- a sometimes droll,…
Homicidal rage against a corrupt world spews into the audience in Palm Beach Dramaworks' Sweeney Todd. But its singular spin is that the serial throat-slitting barber does not start as a ven…
Those who love Stephen Sondheim and Sweeney Todd in particular should come with an open mind to this month's edition at Palm Beach Dramaworks expecting a different spin on the material.
Merriment is a word we don't use much in the 21st Century, but that is the precise adjective to reflect the madcap abandon, tireless physical comedy and unflagging enthusiasm that makes a su…
Minnie's Boys is a light comic highly homogenized version of how stage mother Minnie Marx utzed, kvetched and kibbitzed her five sons to transform from a doomed vaudeville singing group to, …
With Fireman Are Rarely Necessary, this world premiere of a socially satirical comedy falls solidly in the anarchic absurdist vibe with grunge icing championed by Mad Cat Theatre Company.
It's difficult to say if the music and lyrics of Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 are noteworthy, but they are overwhelmed by a production and performances arguably beyond nearly …
Caldwell Theatre co-founder Michael Hall, among the pioneers who transformed a fledgling theater scene focused on molding warhorses and built it into a vibrant regional force embracing chall…
For some reason, Six Degrees of Separation has fallen off the radar of regional theaters mounting semi-contemporary plays that depict and dissect the angsty zeitgeist of modern life. But the…
The stage is a fungible place. Sets can transform, actors can fly, characters can break walls, especially the fourth. There is limitless potential in the blank canvas of floorboards and ligh…
The skill, power and imagination that Kevin Black, Ben Bagby and their colleagues have invested make Swing! Swing! Swing! as good or better than any other revue that Broward Stage Door has p…
Splendidly gorgeous to watch, the creativity of the staging is reason enough to embrace Finding Neverland at the Broward Center On a deeper level, though, there's something profoundly moving…
Leave it to M Ensemble to teach an audience a bit of Black history in Pearl Cleage's Flyin' West , while entertaining the masses.
If you wonder what the term "coup de theatre" means, it's easier to illustrated it with a moment from the new Paula Vogel-Rebecca Taichman play Indecent.
The final tear-inducing five minutes of Beauty and the Beast, if executed effectively as it is at The Wick Theatre production, is a good barometer of whether you're dead inside.
In this dispiriting time of eroding international relations, the incisive play Oslo is both hearteningly optimistic and existentially pessimistic about human beings' ability to negotiate and…
Acknowledging that WWII vets also came home to challenges from their nightmarish service, the rousing new mainstream musical Bandstand has serious issues under the original score and heartfe…
Granted, a farce documenting the doomed efforts of a hapless British theater troupe already has been brilliantly explored in Noises Off. But there is hilarity yet to mine as evidenced by The…
The wobbly foundations of fledgling New City Players' production of David Auburn's reliable Proof are unlikely to impress seasoned theatergoers, especially those who have seen the play befo…
City Theatre's Summer Shorts, which only recently began showcasing musicals, includes three this year including one by Lin-Manuel Miranda.
Lots of news: South Florida Theatre League's free Summer Theatre Fest, Curtain Call Playhouse is honored, City Theatre's Margaret Ledford is promoted, Bruce Linser takes on a new job,and Pet…
One pleasure watching a drag show regardless of your sexual orientation is the vicarious joy of seeing people uncorset their secreted urges and find the liberating self-worth to parade it pu…
Infinite Abyss, which has produced some solid work like last season's Extremities, just falls flat this time out with Quills which reeks of amateurism.
The surprisingly delight-filled musical Groundhog Day is well worth seeing on Broadway but the script, music, lyrics and replicable staging (all Tony-nominated) are so strong, so inventive, …
The temptation is to announce that 'a star is born' in Actors' Playhouse's production of the musical It Shoulda Been You. But that would be mildly insulting to the fact that Cindy Pearce has…