Shirley Jones's act at Feinstein's last night was a treat for her biggest fans, who laughed, cheered, stood, and even cried. For the rest of us, however, the news was not as good.
Photo: Daniel TernaTheChanging Room, by David Storey, is not big on plot. A bunch of Englishmen enter a locker room, kid around, change, and go out to play rugby--Act One. The owner of…
Until this production, Abe Burrows' Cactus Flower had not had a major New York revival. That was a good thing. It is hard to understand why anyone would want to revive this flat, unbelievabl…
Photo: Joan Marcus.Well-done story theatre uses its combination of telling and showing to invite the audience into the creative process. We help the performers invent entire worlds out of&nb…
If you look up the word lovely in the dictionary, there she is: Kate Baldwin, with her sweet, pure voice, beautiful smile, and great charm. In her current show at Feinstein's, She Loves Him,…
Anthropologist Krystal D'Costa was my companion for The Man Who Ate Michael Rockefeller. For her insightful take on the show, click here.
While watching the Wooster Group's pretentious, pointless, and ham-handed production of Vieux Carré, a question occurred to me: What if it's not that the emperor has no clothes but rather t…
Apple Cove is a satire of people who choose conformity and control to feel less frightened by the rest of the world. The show starts when newlyweds Alan and Edie move to the rule-bound Apple…
Photo: Lia ChangIn 1961, the anthropologist Michael Rockefeller, of the business-political-philanthropic Rockefellers, visited the Asmat people deep in the jungles of New Guinea. He fell in …
Photo: Richard TermineThere are certain things that are devilishly difficult to pull off in a play. One is having middle-aged people reminisce about a shared wild youth without sounding arti…
StageGrade provides an important public service for New York theatre-goers: it assembles reviews of Broadway, Off-Broadway, and Off-Off-Broadway shows, providing a synopsis, an average grade…
Photo: Isaiah TanenbaumIn Liz Duffy Adams' amazing new play Dog Act, presented by the Flux Ensemble Theatre, the apocalypse has come and gone, and various tribes scramble to survive in a bar…
Photo: James LeynseIn A.R. Gurney's stilted, unconvincing play Black Tie, middle-aged Curtis is thrilled at the prospect of wearing dinner clothes and giving a traditional speech at the r…
Theodora Skipitares has directed a new version of Aristophanes' Lysistrata, featuring performers wearing Skipitares' masks or life-sized puppets. (The other puppet designers are Jane Catheri…
Theatrical satires of theatrical performances have many things in common: enthusiastic but oblivious participants, extreme versions of theatrical clichés, and happy endings where the final …
Photo: B. DocktorYears ago I took a friend to see his first evening of dance. Afterward, I asked him what he thought. He said, "Beautiful people doing beautiful things with their beautiful …
Photo © Susan B. GlattsteinI have decided to start specifying where I sat--and how much I paid to sit there--at the end of every review I write. And here's why:Have you ever gone to see a…
Terri White does not identify a theme to her show at Feinstein's at the Regency, but it is nevertheless clear: the theme is joy. Not that White doesn't sing a sad song or two, and act them n…
The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore. The Mild Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore is far from Tennessee Williams' best work. However, it is involving, funny, sexy, and sad. The situation is…
Photo: Monique CarboniIs there anything left to be said about dysfunctional families? If so, Tommy Nohilly hasn't found it. His debut play, Blood From a Stone, with its echoes of Sam Shepard…
Photo: Joseph AlfordIn a 1915 poem by TS Eliot called "Hysteria," the anxious narrator becomes disturbed by his date's raucous laughter. The show Hysteria, created and performed by the group…
My knowledge of Jean-Paul Sartre's No Exit was limited to the line, "Hell is other people," so I grabbed the opportunity to see the Invisible City Theater Company's production of John Bowles…
Tom Stoppard is a brilliant playwright, but sometimes he can't tell the difference between a play and a lecture. Hapgood's ratio of physics versus theatre is unfortunately skewed toward the…
Photo: Jonathan KeenanSometimes ambiguity adds suspense and atmosphere to a production. Sometimes it is just confusing. At the beginning of Edna O'Brien's Haunted, part of the Brits Off Broa…
Nyack High School presented an excellent production of The Laramie Project for two performances this month. The pacing could have been quicker, but many of the performances were top-notch, a…