460 stories by "Jacob Malizio"
Celebrated actors Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter are real-life friends who are starring on Broadway as two friends searching for meaning in an absurd world. Waiting for Godot is the greatest p…
What's curious in "Waiting for Godot" is that the textual distillation we have come to expect from Lloyd is largely missing. So is his interpretive stamp. For the most part here, he doesn't …
Their finely tuned performances are unshowy and completely in service of the production. They're neither vaudevillians clowning for our enjoyment nor thespians hamming up each ponderous line…
Neither one of them is reinventing the wheel, and neither is Lloyd. Despite the absence of a tree"or maybe they're inside the tree?"it's a relatively straightforward Waiting for Godot that's…
Is Reeves any good? Eh, not really. This particularly meandering and stiff "Godot" is hardly an excellent adventure. Nor, by the way, is it a bogus journey. It's, as Bill and Ted would say, …
As for the acting, there's little doubt that Winter is the most natural (and more experienced) stage actor of the two, more versatile and, when necessary, capable to drawing real pathos from…
This production isn't exactly cracking the material open in any new way, but soars in one particular aspect: the friendship between its leads. Reeves and Winter are old friends playing old f…
Lloyd's production isn't an embarrassing misfire but it's underwhelming. This is a work in which the slapstick clowning and the tricky verbal non sequiturs should be merely the surface for r…
The pleasant prospect of seeing Reeves and Winter together makes this production to some extent critic-proof"and anyhow, this is a play in which "Crritic!" is the worst insult that Estragon …
This return match-up ("Together again at last!") has turned the playwright's vaudevillian clowns into comics of a cooler sort. If not stoner dudes " they are, after all, both 60ish now " the…
Bobby Cannavale, James Corden, and Neil Patrick Harris return to the stage in the first Broadway revival of the Tony Award®-winning play ART by Yasmina Reza. Directed by Scott Ellis (Take…
The play itself, however, is a lot more interesting than a mere star vehicle, and is proving to be remarkably resilient. It's easy to picture similar arguments about buying NFT art, or a Pat…
This first Broadway revival promises luxury and stars; its black-and-white poster has Bobby Cannavale, James Corden and Neil Patrick Harris suited-up and laughing expensively, politely. That…
Art is as smart a commentary on friendship, identity, and the unspoken expectations that tie them together as it ever was. Sure, it's wrapped in the veneer of high-brow aesthetic debate, but…
Corden is reasserting himself as a major theater actor, and his turn as the wobbliest vertex of a friendship triangle would, alone, make the new production of this slippery social satire wor…
The result is a slender but amusing 90-minute evening of Broadway entertainment. Is it art? Maybe not. But why argue?
The post Art appeared first on Did They Like It?.
As Art's three buddies set up their impending conflict, we know exactly where they're heading. This production eventually rewards our patience, even if we sometimes wish for quicker brushstr…
In this respect, "Art" is a poor man's "Glengarry Glenross." Here are plays that are often revived because stars want to appear in them so they can deliver these showy acting-class scenes.
T…
As both the heart and the court jester for the show, Corden is superb, a perfectly calibrated level of hysterical, sincere and crisp. One blistering monologue sees him ranting, in the voice …
It was hard to know if it was the play or the cast that prevented me from connecting with the characters on a level beyond smug satire.
The post Brilliant or Blank? 'Art' Frames Love-Hate Br…
Legendary comic Jeff Ross returns home for his long-awaited Broadway debut in TAKE A BANANA FOR THE RIDE " a hilarious, heartfelt one-man show about laughing through the pain, the importance…
"Take a Banana" is, however, a willfully upbeat show; whenever it gets too dark, Ross detonates another joke. In his banana-yellow suit (by Toni-Leslie James), he takes us on a tour of his f…
This deeply personal, moving, and undeniably funny show is first and foremost a love letter to the chaotic people (and pets) that made Ross who he is. The experience of losing them is what h…
Here, though, laughs are not the final goal. Vicious comedy may be Ross's superpower, but this show aims to reveal his secret identity as the nicest of guys: an über-mensch.
The post Take a…
Death does not become him. Frankly, it's a bore, as is his fixation on his own health, which went bad from the get-go.
The post The Roastmaster General Packs Little Sizzle appeared first on …
